Somniarus
by artemis7337
Summary: What if a Somniarus- a mage able to control and shape the Fade- existed in Ferelden in 9:30 Dragon Age? This is the story of a powerful girl whose very nature made her a threat, and whose same nature could be instrumental in helping to save the world.
1. Chapter 1

**Well hello there, readers of the world! This is just a little DA:O idea I got from a side quest in DA2. Hope you enjoy, and please, reviews equal love. Feedback only helps the writing grow stronger!**

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><p>Somnarus<p>

~O~

Chapter One: Parvulus

_This job is the worst_, Ser Brent thought darkly. He tightened his grip around the little bundle in his arms as it wriggled and thrashed around. _Oh, yeah, service of the Maker, protect the world from maleficarum, blah, blah…_ No one mentioned the screaming children or demented families templars had to deal with on a daily basis. _I mean really, who runs down and calls for the Chantry at the first bad dream?_ Absurd, even if they had been right about her having magic. They didn't even look sorry as he hauled their little girl away.

The bundle thrashed again and almost tumbled out of his arms. He glared at Ser Corran, who was standing well out of the way of the screaming bundle and struggling templar. Readjusting his grip on the writhing child, he walked quickly over to his horse before she tripped them both and sent them sprawling in the mud. A white hand slipped out from the blankets and reached back towards the woman standing in the doorway. "Mama…" the girl whispered. She quieted almost instantly as Ser Brent swung the two of them into the saddle. A pale face peered from the rough blanket, looking behind as the small cottage—her only home—shrunk in the distance.

~O~

They rode until the stars peeked out of the blue sky and the moon showed her pale face in full glory. The unusual clarity of the night signaled to Ser Brent the impending storm waiting to break. Once a sailor's son, always a sailor's son… or something like that. The girl was sitting in front of him, as still as the cool evening air. It was a startling change from the kicking and thrashing of the morning. Her brown hair looked almost black in the moonlight as Ser Brent gently lowered her from the saddle. The other templars were busy setting up tents and feeding the horses. The girl stared around with wide eyes, looking grave and scared. Well, Ser Brent admitted ruefully, we're not exactly the most comforting group. The moonlight glinted off of silvery plate armor and the pommels of sheathed swords hanging at their hips. Their giant helms hid their faces except for the eye slit in front, showing a blank visage that offered a counterpoint to the flaming sword of Andraste stamped on their breastplates. Not that any of them were wearing their helms anymore. Ser Brent shook his head imperceptibly and grabbed the horse's reins, intending to care for it for the night.

The girl grabbed his leg before he took a step. Dark eyes silently implored him to stay. _She's a mage, she's a mage… what does it matter what she wants? Mage mage mage…_ Ser Brent saw her chin give the slightest of quivers. _She's a little girl_, a voice in the back of his head said reprovingly. _Shut up conscience_… He raised a gauntleted hand to his face. Then he thought better of it, remembering the spikes and joints.

"Ser Fennis?" he called. Another templar looked up, an eyebrow raised. "Could you please tie up my horse? It'll take but a moment, and I'll owe you…" he wheedled. The dark haired man scowled.

"Why can't you do it, Brent? Not my Maker cursed job…" Ser Brent glanced at the girl, still clinging to his leg. He pried her little fingers loose and bent down.

"Little mage, what's your name?" he asked gently, flashing a glare at Fennis. She stared at him gravely for a moment.

"Rebeka," she said quietly. _Unusual name for a farmer's girl_, Ser Brent noticed idly.

"Well, Rebeka, how would you like to help me with my horse here?" Her little mouth popped open in a small "O".

"Really? Papa never let me touch Clyde before," she squeaked. Her eyes sparkled at the thought. Ser Brent couldn't help but smile, she was so eager. "I promise I'll be careful!"

"Okay, follow me then…" She smiled happily, following her new friend with a skip. Ser Brent took his charger's reins and brought him to the others' horses. Fennis spat wetly on the ground as Ser Brent strode by, earning him a look of contempt from his fellow templar.

"Bloody lunatic," Fennis muttered. He glanced over and spat again as she saw the insane new templar actually beginning to show the mage child how to care for the horse.

~O~

The next day the templars woke up bright and early. Ser Brent knew he would be more than glad to return to Kinloch Hold. _Only one more day of travel, and then we get our comfy cots and thin blankets back in the Tower_, he thought with a wry smile. Rebeka was all ready to go by the time he had gotten packed up.

"You know, Rebeka, you are a pretty good child," Ser Brent began with a smile. "My little brother would never have been ready to go after a day of travel like yesterday." She smiled, showing little white teeth, and giggled.

"Mine either," she said happily as he swung her into the saddle. "But he's just a little baby, so that's okay." As she chattered on Ser Brent felt his gut give a little twist. He couldn't identify the emotion, but suspected it was something between pity and anger and sorrow.

The senior templar in charge set an easy pace for the day. It wouldn't be too hard on any of them, including the horses. Rebeka seemed to have forgotten the ordeal of the day before, babbling about her family and baby brother, and the big farm horse Clyde, and even the puppies the neighbor's dog had had. She chattered about butterflies, and apples, and whatever crossed her fancy as they rode west across the Bannorn. And, of course, she asked questions. Endless questions. Questions about the templars' armor, their swords, the horses' tack, the horses' names, their direction, the time, can I go to the privy, what's that, when are we eating, where are we going, when will we get there… Ser Brent was getting a headache trying to keep up.

By mid-afternoon, breezes began blowing strong out of the west from Lake Calenhad. The sky had been growing hazier and hazier all day until it looked a uniform gray. On the horizon ahead of them, Ser Brent could see the first leading edges of the storm. Rebeka grew quiet for a few moments. He could feel a shiver shake her small body even through his armor. Without thinking he wrapped an arm around her protectively. It warmed him and dismayed him when she leaned back into him. _She trusts me already_, he thought. _But she'll be ripped away from me in a few hours._ Underlying it all was the thought, _she's a mage. She's a danger to us all._

"Ser Brent," she finally said. Big eyes looked up at him from the small face. "When do we go home?" He frowned, a surge of pity for the poor scrap welling up inside him.

"We are going home, Rebeka. Your new home is Kinloch Hold, the Tower of the Circle of Magi." His voice was gentle as he tried to explain. She seemed to understand.

"Will my mother be there?"

Ser Brent paused. "No," he sighed. "No, your mother won't be there. But you can make a new family at the Tower." She frowned and looked down again, contemplating the horse's mane in deep thought. _She's such a grave child,_ Ser Brent thought.

A bright voice interrupted his thoughts. "What's a 'Magi'?"

~O~

They were forced to make camp in the middle of the afternoon when sheets of rain began to pour from the sky in buckets. Water seeped through the joints in Ser Brent's armor, making him both incredibly cold and uncomfortable. But he was lucky; the water mostly streamed off his sleek plate armor and pattered on his helm. By the time they stopped, Rebeka was shivering convulsively in her thin clothes. Not even the blanket she held protectively around herself could shield her from the rain.

Ser Brent pitched their tents as quickly as he could and tossed her inside the second they were set up. The poor girl was going to catch her death of cold. Dinner was cold and simple, eaten in silence, and they all retired early. "Blasted weather," Ser Brent cursed. "Why can't we have Antiva's climate? Never rains like this there…" He slipped into his bedroll and flipped over discontentedly.

He was woken by a scream. A high pitched voice issued from the tent next to his. His eyes flew open and he dashed out of the tent, heedless of the rain. _Is she hurt? What happened?_ His thoughts flew like the wind, twisting around in his head as he fumbled at the knot holding her tent closed. _The tie must have swollen in the downpour_, he thought as he angrily tore at it. Another scream heralded his success in opening it.

Rebeka was writhing around on the ground, her bedroll ripped to pieces and strewn about. Her blankets were in a twisted tangle near her feet. At some fiend of the night she let out a terrified call that diminished to a whimper. Brent rushed to her side, shaking her desperately. "Rebeka! Rebeka, wake up! Do you hear me? Wake up, Rebeka, wake up!" Her eyes flew open suddenly and she flung her arms around his neck. Ser Brent froze. He could feel the tears flowing down her face and her little tremors as she cried softly.

Ser Brent gently pried her arms from his neck. "There, there, it's okay…" he said awkwardly. _Holy Andraste, what's going on here?_ "Everything's fine, it's just us here_." How in Thedas do you calm a terrified little girl?_ She kept sniffling, hugging her small frame as if she thought that would protect her.

"I'll be in the next tent over okay? I'll come if you need me," Ser Brent said. All the head patting and empty reassurances in the world weren't going to do her any good. She needed sleep. _So do I_, Brent thought tiredly. Caring for a child was too much work.

"Please don't go! Please, they'll get me, they always try to get me…" Rebeka whimpered. Her eyes were wild, desperate. "I don't wanna go with them, they say they're gonna hurt me if I don't and then they do 'cause I say no… I don't want to dream," she babbled, breaking into new sobs at the end. Ser Brent felt himself go numb. The girl was an abomination waiting to happen. How had she denied the demons for this long? He was tempted to pull out his sword and end it there and then. He recalled his thoughts from the previous day: _she's a danger to us all_. She was, more than the others knew. He had to do it, before it was too late.

Rebeka looked up suddenly, meeting his eyes with a strange equanimity that shone through her tears. He could easily have believed she knew his thoughts. Ser Brent felt a stab of guilt as painful as a physical wound flash through him. _She's a child, this doesn't change that. How could I harm a child?_

"I'm sorry," she said slowly. What did she have to apologize for, besides being who she was? "I'm fine now. You don't have to worry about me." Her voice was grave and small. She smoothed her hair and drew herself into a little ball. Ser Brent knew without a doubt that he had been dismissed. He opened his mouth to offer a word of comfort, and finding only ones that rang hollow, he closed it again. The last thing he saw as he exited the small tent was a tiny girl resting her chin on her knees, deep in thought.

The next morning dawned bright. Light streamed from a watery sun, pale yellow in the aftermath of the storm. Rebeka wasn't out as early as the previous day. Ser Brent felt a stab of apprehension as he ducked his head inside her tent to check on her. She was still sitting on the tangled mess of sheets, position hardly changed. Her face was pale and drawn. Below her eyes was a pair of dark purple circles. They looked like livid bruises on her colorless face. He swallowed hard to moisten his suddenly dry mouth and motioned her out of the tent. Emotionless, she got up and walked out. The other templars were waiting impatiently when he finally swung them both into the saddle.

She was silent for a long time. Her eyes were downcast, always on the mane of Ser Brent's horse or the ground ahead of them. His surge of regret almost overpowered his fear, but the thought of a time bomb sitting in front of him caused his muscles to clench unbearably and his heart to hammer in his chest.

"This is why Mama and Papa gave me to you." Ser Brent flinched at the sudden comment from the girl in front of him. "I told them my dreams. They were scared too. But it's okay. They have little Ben, and he won't be as bad as I am." Ser Brent groaned softly, feeling a knife of guilt twist painfully in his gut. _Curse you, Maker. Curse you for making this child suffer under this weight. Why did you put magic in the world if it only hurts those who have it? _

~O~

The land grew more and more familiar, and as it did, Ser Brent grew more and more relaxed. Once they were at the Tower the mages could take Rebeka and begin teaching her control. They could mitigate the threat she posed to the world. And after that he could head up to the chapel and have a nice long chat with the Revered Mother about magic and the Maker. And after that came a nice hot bath, and mages who didn't dream of demons, and warm food, and actual _beds_.

They crested the last hill in high spirits. A startling vista stretched out before them. The waters of Lake Calenhad sparkled in the weak sunlight, waves gently slapping against the shore and the posts of the small pier. A short stretch of the Imperial Highway, built by the Tevinter Imperium in ancient times, ran parallel to them on the right, straight into the waters of the lake. The weathered stone was cracked and broken, useless as a road but still as imposing and forbidding as the day it was built. It was meant to connect Kinloch Hold to the mainland, but failing in that purpose, it marked the quickest path for the ferryman to take. But the most impressive sight of all was the glimpse of the Tower, stretching up into the sky so high it seemed to pierce the clouds. Thick and strong at the bottom, the gray stone tapered to a razor sharp point, a small bulb at the top sparkling with stained glass windows that belied the room's grim purpose.

The templars unloaded their gear from the horses, tied them in the Spoiled Princess's stables, and headed to the dock. The talkative ferryman, Kester, was more than happy to take them across.

The templars and lone mage child crammed into the small boat spent a very quiet half hour feeling the waves of the lake rock them and listening to the chatter of the ferryman. Rebeka still looked pale and sad, surrounded by the unyielding bulk of suspicious templars in plate armor. The sword of Andraste stamped on their breastplates had never looked more imposing.

Rebeka was swept into the grand entry hall of the Tower by the contingent of templars. Ser Brent was almost unrecognizable in his blank faced helm. The iron did not betray a hint of the conflict raging in his head. He felt an unreasoning affection for the little girl being herded so coldly by his fellows, but his fear of the danger she posed was enough to make him back away. Walking bomb, he remembered, was a spell some of the mage students learned_._ Corrosive poison that made the victim explode. She was like that, but it wasn't her fault. She didn't deserve his coldness, the distance his fear put between them. _She looks scared again_, he noted.

She was taken to a small room of unornamented stone off the main hall and made to wait with the other children brought by other templars. There was at least a full squadron's worth of templars in the room keeping watch over the children. Rebeka looked at them slowly and went to sit near the clump of tiny bodies. They were all quiet, seeming to draw strength from each other.

The door opened. A man with a long gray beard and neat gray hair strode in, his robes whispering around his legs as he walked. The First Enchanter smiled at the room in general as another man, the Knight-Commander of the templars in the Circle Tower, followed him in.

"Hello, children," he said warmly. The little ones looked like a covey of owls, their eyes big and round as they gazed at these new strangers. "I am First Enchanter Irving. I am here to personally welcome you to the Circle of Magi. We will be taking you to the apprentice quarters right away, but first, we have one last duty to perform." He waved the attending mages forward and Ser Brent watched as they quickly filled small glass phylacteries with the children's blood and began labeling them. Rebeka sat quietly as they pricked her arm and drew the blood.

The last he saw of that little girl was a short glimpse of her dark blue eyes and small pale face as she was taken from the room by the mages. Her small smile was the most heart-wrenching thing Ser Brent had ever seen.

Less than a week later, he was sent to Denerim to hunt apostates and maleficarum at the special request of the Knight-Commander.

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><p><strong>Hope you liked! Please remember to review :)<strong>


	2. Chapter 2

**A big huge thank you to all those who reviewed, I really appreciate you taking the time to give your valuable opinions! Here's the next chapter, I hope it answers any questions...**

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><p>~O~<p>

Chapter Two: Claustrum

"Rebeka!" Senior Enchanter Wynne's voice cracked across the library like a whip. Rebeka was slightly surprised; she hadn't realized she was in the Tevinter Imperium. _And here they say mages can't travel by magic_, she thought sarcastically. _I sure _feel_ like a Tevinter slave_. She pasted a helpful smile on her face and looked up at the Senior Enchanter.

"Yes, Senior Enchanter?" she asked sweetly. The older woman's face darkened, casting shadows over her age wrinkled face. The flickering hundreds of candles strewn around the library still could not bring light to her expression.

"I expect my students to pay full attention to my lessons, Rebeka. A mage who misuses these talents could end up an abomination. You should know this more than anyone." Rebeka felt an eyebrow rise involuntarily. The other apprentices were glancing furtively between the student and teacher from behind their books.

"Senior Enchanter, I beg your pardon, but I have been paying attention to your lecture."

The red robed woman mirrored the raised eyebrow of her student. "Is that so? Then you might be so kind as to tell the rest of us the last point I made." Rebeka sighed. _Does she have to do this every time? _

"You said, and I quote, 'Spirit healing is different from usual creation spells due to the necessity for the healer to maintain a connection to the Fade for the duration of the spell. This connection means that a greater variety and severity of wounds and diseases can be treated by a spirit healer that cannot be healed by a garden variety healing spell.'" Rebeka stared at the Senior Enchanter blandly, resting her arms on the desk. The silver-haired woman sniffed and turned back to resume the lesson.

~O~

Rebeka dumped her books into her bag and strode out of the library before Wynne could say anything else after the lesson. Spirit healing seemed like a useful tool, but inefficient and dangerous in a battlefield environment. Maintaining that connection would have made any other activity impossible for most mages, excepting of course an expert like Senior Enchanter Wynne. _I wonder if there's an easier way for the mage to pass through the Veil_, she mused, striding down the curving stone corridors of the Tower. _Perhaps a combination of lyrium and wakeroot would do it, or maybe a grounding elixir instead of the root… _

She entered the apprentice quarters, still lost in thought. She noticed Jowan near his bunk chatting with a pretty female apprentice. Rebeka was about eighty percent sure her name was Bethany. Maybe less. She shook her head, chuckling. Whatever her name, Jowan was hopeless at talking to girls. _He tries too hard to be cool_, she thought, stifling a giggle as he smoothed his hair back and tried to lean against the bunk. The blonde apprentice looked slightly uncomfortable.

"Oh, Beka! Bethany, have you met Rebeka?" Jowan said, spotting her as she walked over. Bethany shook her head warily. "Well this is my friend Rebeka. Beka, this is Bethany. Enchanter Veeran is her mentor."

"Oh, that's fantastic. I've always liked Veeran," Rebeka said, mentally berating her friend for using a nickname in front of his target. Her smile made her dark blue eyes dance. Bethany nodded coolly. Rebeka took a deep breath, feeling the smile slide from her face. "I take it Enchanter Veeran told you about some of the apprentices around here? I assure you, I'm mostly harmless."

The blonde pressed together her lips. "I've got to go. I'll see you around Jowan." She walked away deliberately.

Rebeka waited for about two seconds as she left the quarters. "Did you notice her eyes matched her robes? Very light blue. And those hips…" Rebeka whistled softly. Jowan glared with brown eyes. "You know, I think you have a thing for blue eyes. Or maybe its hourglass figures, I'm never sure," she teased.

Jowan just shook his head. "The way you talk about female apprentices, you could be the twin of Carter. I swear…"

"You should be thanking me you know," Rebeka continued, flopping down on her bunk. "You were in trouble there; I gave you something to talk about at least." Jowan made a noise. Rebeka thought it meant he was indignant. _ I'm never sure when it comes to that boy_, she thought.

"Yeah, right, you basically chased her off!" Jowan flinched as the words left his mouth. Rebeka grew quiet. Jowan's mouth opened and closed like a fish for a few moments before changing the subject. "How was the lecture?"

Rebeka took a few moments to answer. "Well, it was Wynne. Can't expect much from those encounters." Jowan nodded in agreement.

"Well, at least tomorrow you won't have to deal with her. You've got Herbalism tomorrow right? And potions?"

"Yeah… you know, Jowan, I think I'll turn in for the night." Rebeka grabbed her blanket and rolled over. Jowan sighed mournfully. It was true; he really couldn't talk to girls.

~O~

Rebeka could see the templar in the corner stiffen as she drifted off to the Fade. Of course, everyone in the Tower knew about her special magic. That didn't make things easier, though. On the contrary, she could hardly have a conversation with anyone because they were so afraid of her spontaneously becoming an abomination. The thoughts drifted from her mind as she felt her spirit being pulled across the Veil, the ethereal barrier between the physical world and a world shaped by imagination.

Rebeka opened her eyes and felt a thrill. Other mages told her that the Fade made them feel uncomfortable. It was strange, that much was true; the Fade was a twisted version of their own world, shaped by spirits who didn't understand what they were trying to copy. But the Fade always looked different to Rebeka.

To her, it was a world full of possibilities. With a blink of her eye, she could build a castle and raze it to the ground, shape creatures, find her way through dreams, build more complex feats of architecture than was possible in the physical world. She could make her very own fairy tale and watch it as little actors made of marshmallow and toothpicks put it on as a play. She was a Somnarus. She had the power to manipulate the Fade.

But she wasn't happy to be there. Not as happy as usual. _No_, Rebeka thought. _No, I want to kill something. _She could feel anger and frustration coursing through her veins. Wynne, Bethany, templars trailing her everywhere, stares of the other mages wherever she went, being trapped in the Tower…

"Come out demons!" she screamed out. "Come out, I know you're out there! Come on, so I can kill you and send you back to the Black City where you belong!" Purple fire gathered at her finger tips as she began to pace, screaming her challenges. _Oh, just one rage demon, just something that I can kill_, she thought fiercely, tugging at the Fade, sending pulses of magic out to tempt them. The Fade-scape stayed clear, soundless as the demons hid. Rebeka suppressed the urge to hiss and prepared to sprint off in search of something to kill.

"You know, after about your tenth birthday we wised up. No one will fight you when you're in this mood," a silky voice rang out behind her. Rebeka turned around and smiled ruefully. She allowed the fire gathered in her palms to die. A purple skinned woman stood in front of her, black horns twisting from a head wreathed in bright purple fire. She was barely clothed, in the most exotic ruffles and ornaments possible. Her chest was indecently bare, with the slightest coverage to prevent truly obscene exposure. Rebeka shrugged apologetically at the desire demon.

"You mixed up canon too," she purred, floating over. Her voice was still seductively smooth, placing inflection in strange places. Rebeka hadn't ever thought the word 'canon' could sound sexual, but wonders never cease… "I believe that it's the darkspawn who are from the Black City."

"Ah, yes. I always forget that tidbit. Perhaps I should try to attend the Chantry sometime so I can catch up on my Threnodies and Transfigurations."

The desire demon shook her head, a smile playing across her seductive features. The purple skin wasn't that disturbing to Rebeka. Most demons had no idea that they were the wrong color or shape for the physical world, though she suspected this demoness knew full well what she should look like, judging from the tiny screams of apprentices she'd consumed. They still floated in the air around her, a small word of caution to the canny mage.

"So what brings you to us as angry as you were? Usually you just want to build floating castles or talk to spirits. Not that I mind that last, Righteousness has been getting on my nerves lately about the morality of the whole trading life force for desires thing."

Rebeka laughed. "Ah, you know, the usual. Templars, Senior Enchanters, class work, envy… It'd be nice if they would quit being so paranoid. I dealt with you guys as an untrained five year old. What makes them think I'd suddenly quit looking out for myself and take the back seat to you? I doubt even a pride demon could get me."

The desire demon looked at her strangely. Rebeka rolled her eyes. "Yes, that sounded prideful. But hey, I know your tricks. You guys are terrible at hiding, even when I'm not looking." Rebeka began to gain altitude, strolling through the air a few feet above the ground. Constellations began appearing around them and the ground vanished into a cloud of dark blue that seemed to permeate the very sky that surrounded them. The desire demon stared in wonder as she found herself walking through the night sky.

She shook her head, unaware that Rebeka was watching her out of the corner of her eye, and said, "You know, if the templars are bothering you that much, we could always work something out." Her voice seemed to get even more seductive, carrying a musical quality underneath the deep tones. Rebeka suppressed a grin. "You want out of the Circle Tower, and I want out of the Fade. If we work together, we can both get our desires. It's a win-win situation."

"Except of course for the resulting dead mages and angry templars. And after that, our expedient return to the Fade. I don't get a second chance when I get killed, you know," Rebeka reminded her purple skinned friend skeptically. The desire demon harrumphed in a most unladylike fashion.

"Killjoy," she muttered. "Well what do you suggest?" Rebeka looked at the demon, eyebrows raised.

"I have a funny feeling you know what I would suggest." She grew tired of walking in the stars, so she banished the blue, turned off the stars, and brought up the sun. A green vista spread out below them, extending to a bustling city of thatched roofs and gray stone in miniature. The walls of the city ran straight up to sheer cliffs, with one huge, accessible harbor. Rebeka and the desire demoness seemed like giants as they towered over the city. The ocean churned below, bright blue and sparkling in the sunlight of the Fade. The desire demon seemed thrown again.

"This is Amaranthine, or at least what I think it looks like from what I've read. Most likely it's stormy there right now, but there has to be sunshine sometime."

"How do you do that?" Her black eyes stared into blue ones, somehow still managing to convey longing and curiosity despite the uniform color.

"Can't all spirits shape the Fade?" Rebeka asked, stopping her slow stroll to look at her companion.

"I don't mean that," she said. With a wave of her hand, she returned them to the normal Fade, mossy green walls feeling rough like stone against Rebeka's touch, gray patches feeling springy under her feet. Water poured from a waterfall near them. She dipped a hand in and felt that it was warm and saw that as it fell into seemingly open air, it formed a ribbon and twisted away against all constraints of gravity.

"How do you bring your world here? I couldn't do that if I tried. The Fade always looks like a fractured reflection. You bring us something real."

Rebeka paused, openmouthed. "I… not all of us can do it, you know." The desire demon waved her off.

"Of course we know that. Other mages than you have been in the Fade, my friend."

"Well, I have no idea how I do it. It's just something I can do." The demon seemed disappointed. Rebeka didn't know what to say. She felt bad. All the spirits of the Fade could do was look through an impermeable barrier between thought and reality and try to understand. All they wanted was to be able to live like the others on the opposite side of the Veil. And this particular demon had stuck with her for years. She really was something like a friend.

"It starts with imagination," she said softly. "And if the Chantry is right, then that is something you never had. And it's not your fault that you were built that way. But I can show you what my world looks like, what it really looks like. I don't know much, but I can teach you about it. Maybe then you won't need to possess mages to see Thedas." The desire demon looked up, and for the first time Rebeka saw the guile and deviousness fall from her face. She looked almost innocent, and Rebeka glimpsed a sparkle of hope in her black eyes.

She spent the rest of the night teaching the desire demon about her world, about the physics, peoples, plants, animals, structures. She taught her the principles of gravity and the science behind solidity. But the night was short, too short. She had to go before long. She could feel her body tugging her back to the waking world, and she had to answer. _I'm not ready to become a spirit yet_, she thought. The desire demon understood her expression and stepped back.

"I have to go," Rebeka began. The demon nodded. "Keep practicing. Maybe you can change. Who knows, someday you may not even be a demon anymore." The demon's face was inscrutable, but Rebeka had hope. _I have to tell Irving about this_… she thought before succumbing to the tug.

She woke to the apprentice quarters. Jowan made a strange noise in the bunk above hers. Dawn began to break through the small window in the apprentice quarters. Nothing in the world acknowledged the wonders she had created during the night.

~O~

A steady _clink_, _clink_, _clink_ followed Rebeka down the stone hallway. The annoying jingling never let up as the templar matched her pace for pace. Huge oak doors lined the hall, muffling the sounds of classes as the mage and her templar passed by.

Rebeka turned to patter up a flight of stairs. Her feet, clad in soft leather slippers, made the tiniest little thumps as they hit the stone. She reached the top and pushed open the door when the _clink_, _clink_, _clink_ turned into a _crash-jingle_, _crash-jingle_, _crash-jingle_. She rolled her eyes and pushed into the large circular hall without waiting for her watchdog to catch up. The crashing sound stopped abruptly, resuming the normal steady clinking.

Rebeka whirled around. "Would you like to walk next to me? The clinking and jingling are really getting on my nerves." The templar stiffened. Rebeka continued to stare askance. _Is he just going to stand there all day?_ "You may as well answer, Gregoir will be upset if we're late to the meeting."

"That's Knight-Commander Greagoir to you, mage. And I'd prefer to walk behind you." Rebeka resisted the urge to hiss at him.

"Yeah, just in case, right?" she muttered. She turned and cut across the hall towards the First Enchanter's office. Creepy Owain and his Tranquil brigade were busy tidying up the stockroom. The faint sounds of lyrium smithing came from a sheltered alcove where another Tranquil was working.

The large echoes of the huge round hall were stifled in the hallway, carpeted as it was with thick woolen runners. Bookshelves lined every available space, especially in the library, adding their homey musty smell to the air.

Rebeka passed the resident chapel, wrinkling her nose at the overpowering smell of incense. She could spot Keilli praying, as usual, and hear the sounds of Lily the initiate cleaning up for the evening session of soul-reclaiming and devoutness. And then finally, after all the clinking and jingling and that insufferable chapel with its insufferable Chantry nuts, she arrived at Irving's door.

A quiet knock, followed by a warm "Come in!" from the First Enchanter invited Rebeka to enter the room for their daily meeting. "Please, sit, Rebeka." Irving motioned to a pair of comfy looking padded chairs.

The templar positioned himself near the door, looking like a set of plate armor on a stand for all the movement he made. Greagoir and Irving were standing by a great desk, heaped with important documents and thick tomes. A glass of tea in a delicate and distinctly feminine looking china cup was perched on top of a rather precarious looking stack of books. Examining the flowery design on the porcelain container, Rebeka decided that if she had a frumpy old aunt with a penchant for taxidermy, that aunt would likely have owned that china set.

"Your attention please, Apprentice Chase," Greagoir said, fixing her with a sharp Templar gaze.

"Another one? And I thought Anders was being carefully looked after this time. You templars aren't doing your jobs right he keeps escaping, you know."

Greagoir's hand tightened around the hilt of his sword. His eyes were fixed on the apprentice, who was staring back at him with a mildly interested expression. Irving was hiding a smile behind his flowery tea cup.

"Ahem. If we may begin, Appre… er, my dear. What exactly did you dream last night?" Rebeka smiled. One could always count of Irving to step in when Greagoir became frustrated with the idea of mages. Rebeka sometimes wondered if Greagoir daydreamed about the Rite of Annulment when he was on duty. She would have bet her nifty set of glass marbles he did.

"Well, at first I wanted to kill a bunch of demons…" she began. "So I tugged on the Fade and tried to summon them…"

"You what?" Greagoir exclaimed, face reddening.

"She isn't possessed, Greagoir, calm down."

Rebeka continued. "None came except the desire demon." The two men nodded; the desire demon had been around Rebeka for years. "She and I had a nice chat, walked in the sky for a little while. She tried making a deal…" Greagoir's fist tightened around his sword again. Irving shot him a reproving glare.

"…which I _refused_. Honestly, ye of little faith…" Rebeka drifted off disgustedly.

"Please continue Rebeka," Irving prompted.

"Anyways, I started teaching her about our world a little bit. I showed her how things look like here and how to make the Fade work like our world."

Greagoir glared, thunderclouds gathering in his already dark expression. "You should not be talking to demons, or showing them anything. You talk about this creature like it is your friend, but that's the first step to possession! Never let your guard down in the Fade, Apprentice."

"But that's exactly what I was trying to prevent!" The men looked askance. Irving seemed interested, Greagoir seemed angry. But Greagoir always seemed angry, so no shock there. "The main reason that demons want out of the Fade is because they want to see the world the 'Maker' created for us, right?" Greagoir harrumphed at her obvious disdain for his religion. "So if the Fade is just like our world, they won't want out. It's a win-win for both of us!"

"I am not so sure, Rebeka, but your heart is in the right place. It would be best for you to not meet with the demon until the Knight-Commander and I have a chance to discuss this."

"Yes, well that will have to be later. Some idiot forgot to make up the guard duty rosters for today, so I have to go down to the great hall and do it myself right now." The Knight-Commander got up to leave, clanking out of the door in a most undignified way. The other templar followed him, making a counterpoint jingle to annoy mages all the way down the hallway.

"Why do they have to jingle? Is that a requirement for templars, or do they just think that clinking metal is attractive?" Rebeka complained, turning back to Irving.

Irving chose to ignore the apprentice's comments. "Why were you trying to attract demons, Rebeka? I believe that we have often gone over the reasons why that would be unacceptable." Her deep blue eyes were guarded as they roamed around the cluttered, yet spacious, office. She couldn't tell him the truth, that being in this cage of a Tower grated on her when she'd felt the freedom of the Fade. Sometimes she wished that her magic could have been a secret, so that she could carry on a decent conversation with her fellow apprentices or have a proper mentor like the others did. But for the good of all, the First Enchanter and Knight-Commander decided to make it public, so that everyone could know what they were dealing with and exercise 'proper caution'.

"Sometimes, I get frustrated. And since demons can't really die, there's no harm in pulverizing them, right? So I blow off steam where I can't hurt anyone." Irving's bushy eyebrows drew together on his wrinkled forehead. His beard sunk low to his chest the way it did when he was engaged in some deep thought.

"Rebeka, this could be dangerous. Frustration and discontent in any mage could prove disastrous, but in you… I fear the consequences."

"There you go again! You sound just like Wynne! I'm always an 'added danger', or a 'likely threat'." Rebeka sprang out of her chair and began pacing.

"It's been twelve years! Twelve years of being constantly followed every minute by a templar who gets rotated so they won't 'lose sight of a potential duty'. Twelve years of having the Senior Enchanters sniff in disapproval as they walk by, and twelve years of having every apprentice in the tower find a reason to scurry away when I come too close!"

The girl stopped her pacing, turning fierce blue eyes on the First Enchanter. "Do you realize that the only two people I can talk to in this place are you and Jowan?" It came out as a whisper.

The First Enchanter looked at his student mournfully, hiding behind his bushy beard a pained expression. They all had to bear their duty; though he cared for the girl, she was part of a bigger picture.

Rebeka turned to go, blue eyes flashing. "This place is a prison…" she muttered.


	3. Chapter 3

**Thanks again to those who reviewed! It's always greatly appreciated. This chapter was a bit of an experiment, so please, let me know exactly what you think. Criticism helps make writing stronger, so even flames are awesome. Trust me. :)**

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><p>~O~<p>

Chapter Three: Effugiturus

The Mage Tower was, despite the ungodly amount of magical energy and suspicious templars, a fairly uneventful place. That was why, on a chilly day in the beginning of winter, Rebeka was startled by the announcement that a contingent of mages was being sent to Ostagar.

Rebeka had read about Ostagar of course. She wasn't an uneducated brute like some apprentices she could name. The fortress had once been an outpost for the Tevinter Imperium in the days when they had ruled Ferelden, used to keep an eye on the Chaisnd wilder folk in the Korcari Wilds. She'd heard the architecture there was absolutely stunning, despite being a simple military outpost at the edge of the continent.

But all she'd heard about another war going on at Ostagar were the whispers of gossipy apprentices and mages who didn't know she was close by. She had that effect on people; as soon as they saw her they made a few polite apologies and rapidly relocated. It had been getting on her nerves more and more lately.

"Beka," Jowan said, breaking into her neatly ordered thoughts and cluttering things up again. "The First Enchanter wanted to see you."

"Already? I thought today was going to be an evening appointment, he couldn't fit me in anywhere else…" She grabbed her books from the table in front of her and prepared to leave the library. "Wait a second. Why were you with Irving? You weren't in trouble, were you?"

Jowan glanced away guiltily. His expression clearly showed that he didn't want to talk about it. Rebeka frowned… but she still turned away. Whatever was on his mind could wait for an hour or two, she was sure.

~O~

Rebeka primly seated herself in the First Enchanter's comfy padded chair and looked at the bearded, robed man. "This is a little early for our meeting. Is everything all right?"

Irving looked down at the blue robed girl in front of him. She wore that earnest, helpful expression that on any other student would have melted the hearts of every teacher in the Tower. She genuinely cared about those around her, even if she did chafe at the constraints of the Circle occasionally.

"I trust you have heard by now that we are sending mages to Ostagar?" he began conversationally. Rebeka's face lit up, hope filling her bright eyes.

"We are sending mainly experienced enchanters, but I also approved your friend Enchanter Amell for the contingent." Rebeka made a face. A year older than her, a year younger than Jowan, the girl was one of the best apprentices in the Tower. Rebeka was always competing against her. She had been Harrowed the day before, and the templars couldn't stop talking about how quickly and masterfully she'd passed it. She was Jowan's friend, but Rebeka had never been that close to her.

"She just passed her Harrowing. Are you sure she's ready for a battle situation? I know Kastor took three days to recover, and I heard that Petra took a week before she was cleared for duty."

Irving gave her a knowing look. _Of course he knows every thought that ran through the heads of the mages in the Tower,_ Rebeka thought. He didn't get to the top position with his impeccable taste in china sets. "I have every confidence in Marie Amell," he said simply.

Rebeka thought about that for a few moments, a pensive look crossing her pale features. "When will I be Harrowed? I've been here for the same amount of time as Marie." Rebeka tilted her head and watched as surprise and dismay flitted across the First Enchanter's face. After a few moments a twisted, humorless smile drifted across her pale features as a sort of dreamy understanding reached her.

"It's either the Harrowing or the Rite of Tranquility for an apprentice mage, First Enchanter," she reminded him. "Only those two choices." She felt her heart rate slowly begin to increase. A headache started to grow at her temples.

"My dear…" The First Enchanter began.

"I… I need some air. May I…?" Irving nodded quickly. The blue robed girl strode hurriedly from the room.

~O~

They were going to make her Tranquil. Mindless, emotionless, cut off from the Fade. Cut off from the only place where she had _freedom_. She felt like a cornered animal.

_Well, if I'm a cornered animal, I'd better act like one. It's time to strike out. _A cool, calculating corner of her mind took over, tamping down the panic and anger. She rounded the curving corridors of the tower, perfect circular walls malignant, every echo seeming like the clanking of armor-clad templars, coming to administer a fate worse than death. How could Irving just leap into something like that so casually? She shook her head, forcing her emotions back into line.

Her feet carried her back to the apprentices' quarters. She half expected to find Jowan trying to flirt with a girl, like he had been those months ago after Wynne's lecture. But he was nowhere to be found. Rebeka hardly registered it, her mind still cool, methodically testing escape plans. She _had_ to escape, of that there was no question. If she didn't, the fear and anger and resolve and joy in her life would vanish, along with her soul. She paused, clutching at her heart. It felt like it was trying to punch its way out of her chest. Maybe it was trying to jump ship before the templars could catch her. _But_, she thought with a grim smile, _a Sword of Mercy through the chest would be better than Tranquility._

She sat down on her bed with a heavy thump.

Any bystander would have learned from Anders' numerous escape attempts. It would be hard, but not impossible. The biggest problem was the templar dogging her at every step. She watched from beneath her eyelashes as the plate-clad buffoon clattered into the hall. Thank goodness he hadn't access to her thoughts. That would definitely have set off alarms.

A cool, detached portion of her brain took over planning. She would go to dinner, and afterwards… but she had to be careful. Everything depended on this.

~O~

Dinner was the same mess of colors and unidentifiable _gloop_ as usual. Even in her state of controlled agitation, Rebeka couldn't help but try to dissect her meal. Were those peas, or ground up pieces of asparagus? And what on earth was that lump of squishy yellow stuff? Every few minutes, she'd stuff a little bit into a bundle of handkerchiefs in her lap. Jowan was nowhere to be seen. Neither, come to think of it, was Marie Amell. Rebeka wished that she could have had time to say goodbye to her friend, but she couldn't wait around.

She trailed back to the apprentices' quarters with the others, pretending to be tired and full. It felt strange to not even have Jowan around. She rolled into her bunk. She was careful to note the locations of all the templars in the room before pretending to drift off to sleep.

Strange echoes disturbed the near perfect silence of the night, drifting from the corridor, moving down the hall. The templars shifted uneasily. One went to the door to check outside. _Unplanned, but not unwelcome, _Rebeka thought. She reached towards the Veil eagerly, weakening the fabric around the templars, pulling their minds into a soft sleep.

They collapsed slowly, quietly. Rebeka smiled grimly. She was nothing if not subtle—when she needed to be. The strange echoes disturbed her, but they were in the opposite direction of the Tower's entrance. There was definitely the clanking of templars, and raised voices… Casting a wary glance behind her, Rebeka set off towards the hall.

~O~

Marie Amell emerged from the basement, relieved to be out of the repository. A newly Harrowed mage and already breaking the rules? But Tranquility was a fate she wouldn't wish on anyone, and especially not on one of her best friends. Despite a constant fluttering of nerves in her stomach at her first and only misdeed in the Circle Tower, she'd helped him. To her disgust, though, some of the blood contained in Jowan's now shattered phylactery had splattered on the hem of her robes. _How am I going to get the stain out without anyone noticing? _

Jowan turned to her, joy suffusing his face. "We did it! I can't believe it! Thank you… without you, we never could have—"

And then the ominous clanking of plate armor filled the hall. Marie whirled around to see a nightmare walk into her life: Greagoir and Irving, along with a contingent of templars to guard the hall.

"So what you said was true, Irving." The Knight-Commander's furious voice filled the grand room.

"I assure you, this isn't what it looks like." _Unless of course it looks like an escape attempt, in which case this is _exactly_ what it looks like._ Marie glanced back at Jowan, who stood next to Lily, the initiate he'd risked everything for; his face was pale as a specter. _And why not?_ Marie continued her sarcastic inner monologue. _He's not exactly going to get out of this unscathed._

"An initiate conspiring with a blood mage. I'm disappointed, Lily," he continued, his voice deadly calm. His wrathful gaze flicked over to Marie. "And this one… newly a mage and already flouting the rules of the Circle."

What little fight remaining in Marie went out when she caught the First Enchanter's sorrowful stare. He seemed more vulnerable and old than she'd ever seen him. "I'm disappointed in you," he said tiredly. "You could have told me what you knew of this plan, but you didn't."

Guilt welled up inside her, threatening to spill out like rain from the fierce storms that lashed Lake Calenhad. Marie opened her mouth to offer… what? An apology?

Jowan beat her to it.

"You don't care for the mages! You just bow to the Chantry's every whim!"

He received a swift elbow to the side. "Shut up, Jowan," Marie hissed. "The First Enchanter does all he can."

But the damage was already done. The Knight-Commander's voice rang out in the still air, cold as steel, sharp as a blade.

"Enough! As Knight-Commander of the templars here assembled, I sentence this blood mage to death." His dark eyes turned back to the initiate. "And this initiate has scorned the Chantry and her vows. Take her to Aeonar."

At this, the spineless Chantry initiate began to whimper. "The… the mages' prison? No… no, please not there!" Marie was just about fed up with the two of them, ruining any chance of talking their way out of there as they were.

But she didn't get truly angry until the knife came out.

Before the Knight-Commander's and the First Enchanter's disbelieving gaze, Jowan screamed, "No, I won't let you touch her!" And then he plunged the knife into his own flesh.

A cloud of blood whirled from Jowan, enveloping those in the room. The templars, Greagoir, and Irving collapsed.

He backed away, seeing the horror in his companions' eyes. Marie watched him as he ran from the hall, not noticing the dark shadow that detached itself from the doorway as he fled.

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><p><strong>So what did you think? Will the templars find Rebeka, or will she escape into the world? There's only one way to find out...<strong>

**R and R, hope you enjoyed, next chapter will be up really soon!**


	4. Chapter 4

**Ok, first I want to start off by saying sorry for taking sooo looong with this update. My summer just got super crazy, and for some reason this chapter gave me a bad case of writer's block. But, it's here now.**

**I also wanted to clear up a really good point made by a reviewer. Rebeka, while a pretty smart girl, is just a teenager, and she's a little paranoid just because of how people have always treated her. Therefore, her assumptions may or may not have been accurate, but it's all she had to go off of with the whole escape plan.**

**Now, you guys are probably tired of me blabbing, so without further ado...**

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><p>~O~<p>

Chapter Four: Periculosus

_Poor planning_, Rebeka thought as she trudged down a dusty road. _Poor planning, poor planning._ She repeated it to herself like some sort of dull mantra, each word matched with an answering thump as her feet connected with the hard packed dust beneath her.

Her phylactery was still in the Tower. She had one small lump of food and no money.

_Jowan appears to have thought ahead_, she continued dully in her thoughts. Rebeka had seen the blood splattered over his and Marie's robes. Rebeka stifled a shiver, thinking about that macabre scene in the hall. The worst part had been the look in Jowan's eyes as the knife plunged into his arm. He had looked half crazed, his eyes far too bright in his head. His face had been twisted into some sort of mask of his former self, barely recognizable to even Rebeka, his best friend. But when he'd backed away from Lily and Marie, all she'd seen was fear.

"It was the blood magic," she muttered. It was partly to relieve the silence of the empty landscape. It pounded at her ears, the quiet. Rebeka had never known true and utter silence before. It almost made her wish for a templar to clank and jingle behind her.

She shivered. "No, don't go wishing for that," she told herself sternly. She spotted a clump of boulders near the roadside. _Time for a rest._

The sun was high in the sky, just past its zenith, and despite being winter it shone with an unusual clarity. Rebeka unpeeled the clump of handkerchiefs from her pocket, making a face at the squished lump of food inside. It had been unsavory to begin with, but now…? She wrinkled her nose and began to eat.

Sitting alone with her thoughts, Rebeka found another source of worry. Her lovely, intricate apprentice robes were too… magey. Any templar worth his skirted armor would notice her the second she stepped within bowshot of a Chantry. _I'll add that to the list of problems_, she thought grumpily.

The little food she'd scrounged didn't make a huge meal. A few mouthfuls at best, and then Rebeka was on the move again. Where she was going, she had no idea. Just away from the templars. Her mind began to wander. Perhaps she'd go to Gwaren, find some work in the port city. Of course, that would mean traveling across the entire breadth of the country. Highever then? It was closer, but more a land of farmholds and livestock. She didn't have the right… skill-set for that kind of work. And living in the Bannorn was out of the question. So that left Denerim…

"Stop!" The word rang out in the still air. Rebeka came to a stop as quickly as if she'd hit a wall.

Standing in the road in front of her was a group of men. They were all dirty and unkempt, and Rebeka could see that their rough leather armor and short swords were not well taken care of. Her heart began to pound as they drew nearer. Swords on men like this could not be anything but trouble.

"Well, 'ello girlie." A man had moved to the front of the group. He had mean dark eyes, like the spirit nug the apprentices all summoned during their training. His eyes looked slightly watery, and once again Rebeka was reminded of the ugly, rat-like creatures. "Are you all alone out here in the big empty open?"

The men were moving casually to surround her. Their intentions were anything but good. "What if I said no?" she asked sweetly, tilting her head like a puppy's to the side.

"Well, darlin', I'd apologize for botherin' you and we'd be on our way," the man said condescendingly. Rebeka felt annoyance begin to sizzle in her at his patronizing tone and pet names. It battled with her suspicion and wariness as she gazed into his dark, ugly eyes. His tone grew sinister. "The thing is, I don't see anyone here with you besides me and my boys."

He stalked forward. Rebeka could see the hunger in his eyes. "Ah, I see. You equate my being alone to my being defenseless." Anger, held at bay for the past few minutes, began to boil up inside her. How many other girls had fallen prey to him and his gang? "I assure you, this is _not_ the case," she hissed.

And suddenly, the Veil ripped. A shockwave of energy ripped through the air around the mage.

The runny eyed leader began to scream in terror as the effects of her Horror spell hit him. His own demons caused him to cringe and cry with the sheer and utter fright. Two men crumpled to the ground, asleep, in a more forcible version of the spell she'd used on the templars back in the Tower. They began to twitch and roll as another Horror spell winged into their dreaming minds.

A metallic scrape sounded from behind Rebeka. She whirled around to see one of the men striking towards her neck with his rust-spotted sword. She had no doubt that it was sharp enough to do the job. With a sudden rush of adrenaline she froze the joints in his arm solid, stopping the blow. Another man came from behind her, thumping up clumsily as he tried to free his sword from its scabbard with shaking hands. His fear was almost comical to her in her adrenaline-high state, and Rebeka cast a Horror on him that he succumbed to with little resistance.

But she'd forgotten the one behind her in her haste. Before she could turn, a brutally hard fist slammed into the back of her skull, tossing her to the ground. Rebeka tried to blink the spots from her eyes, feeling dizzy. The panic and vertigo conspired to make her muscles go limp. Her vision was clearing so slowly…

The man picked up his sword from the ground with his un-frozen hand, holding it awkwardly. His filth-streaked face leered above Rebeka as she lay sprawled on the ground, defenseless. He raised the sword to strike. Rebeka's hand flashed up an instant before the man's sword flashed down. With a mighty burst of light that ripped through the air and a crack that shook the countryside, a bolt of lightning flashed from Rebeka's outstretched hand.

The man crumpled with an agonized cry. For a few moments, Rebeka slumped on the ground, listening to the shrieks and cries of tortured men. When she gained the strength to crawl, she shimmied over to the man she'd shocked. There was no pulse at his neck. The mess of burned skin on his chest was horrifying to look at.

Rebeka stumbled away, resisting the urge to throw up her lunch. She didn't notice the tears that leaked from the corners of her eyes. The screams of the men, minus one, faded away in the distance.

~O~

The smell of vomit, once she'd finally lost her fight with her rebellious stomach, still clung to Rebeka as she sat huddled up against the bole of a tree. It repulsed her almost as much as her hand did, the one that had released that fatal bolt of lightning. She had never expected to kill anyone, never in her life dreamed that she would be capable of that horrible act.

_He deserved to die. I couldn't let him kill me. It was me or him. He would have gone on to do worse things to other girls._ The arguments chased each other around her head. None offered any solace.

What finally jolted Rebeka from her stupor was a loud growl from her stomach. She laughed wetly.

"Time to stop feeling sorry for myself, I guess. He had it worse off than I did, and he's not crying." She didn't stop to point out the lack of sense in that statement to herself.

The grumble reminded her of her previous worries. And though she would rather have left those evil men behind in the dirt, survival was worth more than her bruised feelings.

Rebeka walked back down the road towards a band of men with leather armor and tortured dreams.

~O~

The runny eyed leader and one of the other men weren't there when she returned. The dead man still lay on the ground, his chest a mess that Rebeka wasn't prepared to deal with. She put the cold, sharp persona back on, shrugging it on like a set of robes. The two men she'd put to sleep were still on the ground, more peaceful now.

Sighing, she stripped one of them, searching his pockets for hidden coins. She left the armor in a pile, going instead for the rough shirt and pants beneath. She grimaced at the smell, but laid them aside and continued her search of the other man. She came up with a pouch with less than a half of a gold sovereign. Perhaps forty five silvers, all told. It would have to do.

"And now…" she muttered. She lifted her hand to renew the Horror, choosing the images carefully, letting their own nightmares do the work.

Rebeka walked away once again, calm and cold, with her money and her clothes. Problems solved, problems created. The moaning of the two men behind her resumed as they found themselves trapped in nightmares with all the helpless girls they'd harmed.

~O~

Rebeka's foot slipped into a deep wagon rut in the road. She stumbled, catching herself with a curse.

She looked around with an expression of mild surprise. Twilight had fallen on the landscape around her, cloaking the wilderness around her in soft darkness. It softened the sharp contours of the pine trees and boulders scattered around.

Rebeka scanned the area urgently once she came to that realization, feeling the cold that was beginning to set in. There was a frightening lack of shelter.

She tripped again, darkness shadowing the pitted dirt road. As she once again saved herself from a face-plant, her eyes lit on a tiny shack tucked into a hill beside the road. Rebeka sighed in relief. She stumbled over to it, cursing wagons and mud and rain as she went.

The shack was tiny and had cracks in the age worn wood that made it up. Some animal had made a nest in there recently. But it was dry, and it was out of the wind. There was a roof above her head, if just barely. Rebeka sank down to the floor, weary and heart-sore. _It's not exactly my snuggly bunk in the Tower…but it's something…_

~O~

Rebeka opened her eyes in the Fade. She inhaled deeply, smiling as the blue-white lyrium streamed into her tired body. It made her skin tingle pleasantly, gave her _energy_.

The Fade-scape was different. She hadn't realized it, but the Fade took a usual shape near the Tower. As she looked around, she saw that it mirrored the general landscape she'd been traveling through. The road was off to her right, running parallel to the small rise she was on. She wandered over to it and a small chuckle escaped her.

The ruts in the road were no longer ruts; they were raised bumps. _Spirits._

Rebeka sighed, no longer in the mood to wander the Fade. But she was stuck there until she woke up. She levitated a pebble and absentmindedly tossed it off the edge. It fell down and down and down…

A pebble clattered down the hill behind her. Rebeka whirled. Her eyes hardened.

Before her and a few feet above her as though it was a king standing on a dais, a creature resembling a man slid to a stop. His face was greyish and cruel, his robes rich. He wore a small crown. His eyes gleamed with a reddish hue, like slowly drying blood.

"What do you want, pride demon?" she said coldly. Over his shoulder, Rebeka could just barely make out a pair of fearful black eyes floating in a purple smudge. Her eyes flicked back to the pride demon.

His smile was self-satisfied, condescending. "Child, what does any demon want?" His eyes flashed with a bloody burst of light, slamming into Rebeka with a palpable force. Down to her knees she went with a gasp.

When her vision cleared, Rebeka's heart sank. She was back on the road, the sun high above her. A group of dirty men surrounded a blue clad girl. She watched from behind the ring of men as an ugly, runny eyed man gave a short, self-satisfied speech, as the girl tipped her head and chirped a few words.

She watched as three of the men fell to the ground and screamed at their own nightmares.

She watched, and as she did she heard a soft, sinuous voice wrapping around her mind, whispering to her…

"You see?" it whispered. "Look at how you rejoice in their fear. They are yours to control, and you take pleasure in that fact…" Rebeka shook her head, but she could not tear her eyes away from the scene in front of her. The demon's power held her in an iron grip.

A man's arm froze solid, and the girl whirled away too quickly for Rebeka to see her face. Another man ran, shrieking, from the slight blue figure. An audible thunk came as the girl was knocked to the ground.

And finally, Rebeka could see the girl's expression. The pride demon's low chuckle surrounded her, urging her to look closer at the hate and bestial joy that mixed on her face. Time seemed to slow as the man's sword flew down towards her neck. An expression of twisted elation lifted her features as her hand shot up and loosed that fatal bolt.

"It is power that you desire," the demon whispered triumphantly. "You love their fear, you take joy in killing. You deserve it, with the wondrous power you have. But you crave it, and you know how much _more_ I can give." The man crumpled to the ground. Rebeka wanted to scream; the guilt and fear and anger whirling in her head were too much to bear. "We see your heart, and we know it is ours."

"You should have stayed in your Tower, girl, for it will not be long before you are _mine_!"

~O~

Rebeka flew upright with a gasp. _No, no, no_, she thought. Her heart was racing in her chest. Her mind was still reeling from the emotions that had rocketed through her mind. The sheer power of the pride demon was frightening.

Two things were clear however.

One, her dream realm, which had always seemed so comforting in the past, was no longer a safe refuge. She'd have to be much stronger to deal with this harsh new world.

Two, she was not invincible. Twice in one day she'd come near the brink of death and managed to scrape by. That would not do. She felt cool resolve harden in her gut.

Cold as the dawn, Rebeka gathered her meager belongings and set out from the shack.

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><p><strong>Phew, was that an ordeal to write. Never fear though, I've already got good ideas for the next chapter!<strong>

**R/R please, and thanks for reading!**


	5. Chapter 5

**Okay, so I did this at ten o' clock last night when a sudden burst of inspiration hit me. It's my longest chapter yet! Be warned though: major gore alert. Sorry, folks, but that's how its got to be sometimes. I think I'm seriously disturbed though, cause it just flowed off the fingers. Hmm.**

**Oh, and since I haven't done one of these yet... _Disclaimer: All of this lovely world belongs strictly to Bioware, even the roadside bits their random terrain generators didn't make up!_**

**Onto the story!**

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><p>~O~<p>

Chapter Five: Decessus

Rebeka tilted her face up to the sunlight, enjoying the warmth that played across her face. A small smile creased her lips.

A cloud moved to cover the sun. Rebeka glared up at it sullenly for a moment before sighing and resuming her walk. It had taken her three days of easy travel, hiding like a ragamuffin in the woods and walking with a decidedly downcast bearing, sleeping in the open and scrimping with the rapidly dwindling stock of coins to get enough food, to even get to the southernmost farmholds of the Bannorn. She cringed just thinking about how long it would take to get to Denerim.

But strangely enough, she wasn't alone on the road; not by far. As she'd walked east and joined with the larger roads near the imperial highway, wagonloads of people had appeared on the road, going north and east. The strange accents of people from the Hinterlands and even some Korcari wilder folk swirled around her now as she walked down the once lonely road.

She was still alone. But hearing the creaks of the wagons and the soft chatter of people was better than the drumming silence of the green and gold fields that surrounded her.

Better than hearing the evil cackle of the demon as it preyed on her thoughts and fears.

A shiver ran down her spine, though the day was becoming humid and muggy. _Strange weather for winter_, Rebeka mused, distracted. _We usually get frost and snaps of cold up by Lake Calenhad, but here everything just feels… unclean. Even at night the air smells a little sour._

The demon hadn't returned for the past few days, but she could feel it watching her in the Fade. She'd been frantic to escape it, fleeing through layers upon layers of dream prisons and palaces. Rebeka had woken up exhausted that morning, but it was worth it not to feel its pervasive touch on the edges of her consciousness.

_Perhaps Justice would help me, if I give the right speech. Or perhaps Humility… he hates pride, right? _

"Miss?" Rebeka glanced down. A small frown creased her face. "Miss?" The tiny voice in front of her belonged to a little boy, no more than six or seven years old. His dark hair flopped over his face in an unruly tumble.

"Yes?" she asked, bending closer. The boy glanced around in all directions before blurting something out. His little cheeks were bright pink.

"My friend, I'm afraid you'll have to speak a little slower if I am to understand you." A wry smile flickered on Rebeka's face as she examined the boy.

"What my son is trying to say, miss, is would you like to have lunch with us?" A woman with dark hair and the same dark eyes as the little boy walked over. Rebeka smiled at the woman. Behind the woman she could see a wagon with a little girl and a tall man pulling over to the side of the road. A boy trotted up to them carrying a bundle and hopped up to talk to the man.

"Thank you, I'd love to," she said politely. It wasn't as if she had anywhere better to be. The mother grabbed her little boy's hand and Rebeka followed her back to the wagon.

"I'm Fenna, and my son here is Ryan." The boy gave a happy wave. The woman paused for a moment, waiting.

_I probably shouldn't tell anyone my name_, Rebeka thought. _Not that it will matter much if the templars tracking me with my phylactery…_ Out loud Rebeka replied, "My name is Marie. It's nice to meet you, Fenna." Fenna smiled warmly.

"Jon! We have one more for lunch, dear." The tall man smiled and shook his head good naturedly.

"You and your hospitality, Fenna. You're gonna be the end of me, I swear," he said. Jon hopped down from the cart and offered his hand.

"This is Marie," Fenna said to her husband. "And this is my husband, Jon." Rebeka smiled and shook his hand, wondering what she'd gotten into. The little girl hopped from the back of the wagon. "And this is Saige," Fenna continued. Saige smiled shyly.

"Hello, Saige. How are you?" Rebeka asked, unable to resist a smile. She had always loved helping out with the newest apprentices at the Tower. They had been so cute, and never judged. _No, they just cried if they didn't get their way._ They'd still been cute though.

Saige giggled. She had a little rag doll clutched in her arms. "I love your doll. She's so pretty," Rebeka said gently. A shadow fell over her. Rebeka stood quickly. Her cheeks flushed under his discerning gaze. _Better not be so suspicious next time_, she noted to herself.

The boy who had been carrying the bundle stood in front of her. He had the tall build of his father and the black hair of his mother. He was by no means willowy, however. Rebeka glanced at his strong arms and hands warily before her eyes flicked back to his face. It was stony and suspicious, as hers was. If not for the fluttering in her chest, Rebeka might have laughed at the similarities in their expressions.

"_This_ is my son Dane. Dane, meet Marie." Fenna's voice seemed overloud in Rebeka's ears. She forced herself to relax and extend a hand to the hard eyed son. He shook it and returned it quickly.

"Well, now that that's settled, time for lunch!" Rebeka smiled at the friendly woman once again and turned her back on the distinctly unfriendly boy traveling with them.

~O~

_How did I get myself into this?_ Rebeka wondered for the twentieth time. The sun was beginning to set already; the short days and bitterly cold nights were the only indication of winter's arrival. Rebeka tried to think back to that book she'd read on weather… something about how to tell where storms are based on wind direction and the weather at your current position.

Rebeka had found it while rooting around in the library for a copy of In Pursuit of Knowledge: Travels of a Chantry Scholar, by Brother Genitivi. Her own copy had been stolen and all the other copies on file were checked out. The weather book had actually been quite interesting. The basic idea behind the author's theories was that there were huge bubbles of weather that circled all around continents. One could tell what kind of weather would be where because winds flowed towards bubbles that encouraged storms. Rebeka thought there was more to it than that, but going off his theories, a large storm must have been breaking to the south.

That was fun to muse on for a while, but then Rebeka caught sight of the dark, unfriendly boy talking with his mother. Dane. Rebeka considered the name for a while. Dane. All she could come up with in response was a disapproving 'hm'. He'd certainly made lunch uncomfortable. Rebeka reflected on it with a bit of embarrassment.

"Would you like another sandwich, Marie?" Fenna had asked.

"No, thank you," Rebeka had replied. A long lull in the conversation followed. The little boy, Ryan, had stared curiously at her as he munched on his sandwich. Saige was off to the side playing with her doll, her lunch already devoured. So Jon, Fenna, Dane, and Rebeka were left to finish and converse awkwardly.

"So…" Jon had begun, looking to his wife. She smiled in encouragement. "Where are you from, Marie?"

Rebeka's heart jumped in her chest a little. "Near Lake Calenhad." When she wasn't forthcoming with more details, they dropped that thread of conversation.

The whole time, Rebeka felt Dane's eyes on her, judging somehow. She couldn't help but resent it. _What have I done to deserve his judgment?_ Rebeka had wanted to grind her teeth in frustration.

They finally finished and began packing their things away. Jon loaded Saige into the wagon and set Ryan on the seat next to him before climbing up himself. Fenna had paused a moment.

"Marie, where are you headed?" Her dark eyes held a motherly concern. Rebeka glanced down the road.

"To Denerim, I suppose, and from there…" She'd trailed off bleakly.

"Well, it seems we're going the same way then, at least until we reach Lothering. Why don't travel with us?"

Rebeka had felt a lump rise in her throat. _What a wonderful lady_, she'd thought. "No, no, I couldn't possibly," she'd protested. "I wouldn't want to impose any more." Jon, his bald head gleaming in the sunlight, had shrugged.

"That's that then," he said simply. Fenna had frowned.

"You wouldn't be a bother. That's silly. We can't have a young girl traveling alone out here," she retorted, shooting a glare at her husband. "Now, I insist." She had tapped her foot impatiently. Rebeka had almost smiled, wondering what it would have been like to have a caring, impatient mother cajoling her. _Like this, probably_, she'd thought wryly.

"Alright then. Thank you very much, Fenna," she'd replied, allowing a small smile to slip past her lips.

_And that is how I got myself into this_, Rebeka concluded, closing the matter internally with a make believe gavel on a make believe judge's stand. Up ahead, Jon steered the wagon off the road. The bed rocked and shuddered as it was hauled across the deep ruts in the road. Rebeka walked up behind, standing in the shadows as Jon and Dane unharnessed the oxen and tied them nearby and Fenna erected a tent beside the wagon. It reminded her of a time long before, when she'd been among strangers in plate armor with no idea what to do.

Dane shot her glare that Rebeka fought hard to not return. _What is his_ problem_?_

"Marie, dear, would you go collect firewood?" Fenna's voice drifted from the tent, where she was settling the little ones down. Rebeka called an affirmative response and trotted off into the forest. There were plenty of dead twigs and branches around from the winter frost and storms, so it wasn't too hard for Rebeka to come up with a sizeable pile of good firewood. Jon started it and he and Fenna crawled in the tent to sleep with their younger children.

Rebeka slumped down and ran a tired hand through her hair. Dane's dark eyes shimmered from across the fire, accusing.

"I'm too tired to do this," she finally said. The eyes narrowed.

"Do what?" he growled.

"You hating me, me not knowing why. If you're going to glare at me all the time, at least tell me what I did." He turned away, making a noise almost like a growl.

Rebeka sighed. She didn't want to go to sleep. The suspense of waiting for the demon to spring was almost as bad as when he'd actually visited her dreams. Even talking with this surly fellow couldn't be worse than that creeping, bone numbing chill of waiting for the demon to make its move.

"So… Dane, huh?"

"Do you have a problem with that?" The glimmering eyes were back on her now.

"No, no… still, you don't strike me as a Dane."

He waited quietly, suspicion kindling to life in his eyes.

"I always expected the legendary hunter, Slayer of Wolves and Dragons, to be a bit more… well, I was going to say impressive, but that isn't quite the word I was looking for."

Rebeka watched quietly as he rolled his eyes and made a sound of disgust. "You're such a child."

"Well so are you, that's my point!" she continued gleefully, as though she'd had a life changing epiphany. "I always pictured Dane as being older, more experienced. You can't be older than eighteen!"

"I'm experienced enough," he retorted angrily. "I'm a good enough hunter to find a murderess in the woods!" Rebeka froze, a shard of ice piercing her heart.

"So that's what the glares are for, hm?" she asked softly. Dane cringed, somehow seeming like a small child caught stealing cookies from the jar even through his muscles and angry _looks_.

"Does it matter to you that they would have raped me and left me for dead?" she asked.

Dane's eyes narrowed. "It's not just that. You're a mage."

"And?"

"For one, you're a blight in the sight of the Maker, and for another, you must have escaped from the Tower, and you're probably being chased by templars right now. You're nothing but a danger to my family."

Rebeka ran a hand through her hair again. She could feel a headache building in her temples. "A danger. Yes, I know what that feels like." The flickering light made her look old and weary. "Good night, Dane. I'll try my very best not to destroy your family."

Rebeka grabbed a blanket and walked a few paces from the fire. Curling up on her side, she missed the sparks of remorse in his dark eyes. Her mind was already preparing for the onslaught of nightmares from hungry demons.

~O~

Rebeka's dreams were fitful, full of winding paths and curling mist as she tried to evade the demon. She woke up tired.

_I can't keep this up forever_, she thought, feeling defeat creep over her like a gray cloud. _He's just letting me wear myself down._

Dawn hadn't even begun to light the horizon. The only light left in the wake of the setting moon was the glow from the dying coals of the fire. Even the stars were muffled in a layer of thick fog. Dane was curled near the edge of the fire in a pair of warm blankets.

He looked so peaceful as he slept. Without the angry glares darkening his face, Rebeka realized with some embarrassment that he was actually quite… that his features were arranged in an aesthetically pleasing way. She made a concentrated effort to wipe the blush from her cheeks. _Lack of sleep must be making me loopy,_ she decided. _Yes, that's definitely it. _She took a deep breath and studied her surroundings. The lightening in the sky to the east signaled dawn to come; the light softened curves and edges, as dusk had, but the growing birdsong in the trees made the scene less peaceful, less serene. Rebeka missed the time when darkness was a blanket, comforting and surrounding her.

_Speaking of blankets…_ Rebeka wrapped her own more tightly around her, trying to forget the chill in the air and the rocks speckling the ground.

A low groan came from across the fire pit. Rebeka's eyes snapped towards the sound. Dane yawned again, rolled over, frowned, rolled back, and finally decided to sit up. Rebeka could hear the sounds of his back and shoulders cracking as he stretched. _He sounds like Senior Enchanter Sweeny_, Rebeka thought with a suppressed grin.

"Good morning, sunshine," she chirped. Dane glanced over at her, then promptly ignored her. Rebeka rolled her eyes. "Well, that's an improvement at least. We went from angry glares to pretending to ignore me. I'd say we're almost friends since you're making such sociable overtures now." The sarcasm and false cheer dripped from her voice like honey. She saw Dane blink slowly.

Fenna and Jon emerged and they began to pack up, moving efficiently around the camp. Within minutes the family was ready to go, producing a cold breakfast of bread and cheese to eat on the road. Jon urged on the oxen, and before Rebeka could blink they'd begun moving. _I'll have to start pulling my own weight around here_, Rebeka thought with a bit of chagrin.

The sun was nearing the center of the sky when a loud curse pulled Rebeka from her bleary daydreams.

"Jon, don't use that kind of language in front of the children," came Fenna's scolding voice.

"What am I supposed to say? The damn ox is useless now," he growled. A frown crossed Fenna's face. Rebeka peered over to where the animal was laying down. Jon's face was stormy, and Fenna seemed worried.

"What's wrong?" Rebeka asked. Aside from the fact that it was laying down instead of walking, nothing appeared to be too out of the ordinary.

"Stupid beast stepped in a rut, got its hoof all twisted around. It can hardly carry its own weight now, let alone the cart's."

"Oh," Rebeka said. She promptly moved back. Fenna suggested something quietly, only to have Jon shake his bald head. He looked dissatisfied, but murmured a few words. The two of them nodded, and Jon quickly began to cut the ox loose from the harness.

"I'm not gonna let it slow us down," Jon said over his shoulder in response to Rebeka's questioning look. "Normally, I'd want someone to butcher it so that we'd have the meat, but with the Blight coming, there's no time." _Blight? As in, darkspawn invasion? _Surely she hadn't heard right…

They got underway again soon enough. Dane returned from wherever he'd gone to and handed a small pouch that clinked with coins to his father. _They must have sold the ox to someone on the road_, Rebeka guessed. With only one ox left however, the little group began to fall behind. The tops of the wagons of fellow travelers faded in the distance. A few travelers matched their path, but they began to veer northwards. By late afternoon, the road was deserted.

A fluttering of nervousness began to stir Rebeka's gut. _I don't have a very good feeling about this_, she worried. A blood red sun cast their shadows before them as they slowly moved down the road. Rebeka could almost imagine their dark reflections grinning and leering at the sweet family. Dane walked a few feet away, his face grim. A deathly stillness began to fall over the landscape.

Rebeka's eyes widened suddenly. "Look out!" she shrieked. A horrible noise rang out from the trees to their right. "No!" she shouted, finding herself on the wrong side of the wagon. Jon let out a shout and whipped the ox forward. Saige whimpered in the back of the wagon.

"What are those things?" Dane asked. A look of revulsion and horror creased his face. Rebeka skidded around the wagon and gasped.

Gone was her fear at a motley crew of bandits. What were mere humans compared to these horrendous creatures? Some hardly seemed more than animated skeletons, walking despite swathes of tattered, rotting skin hanging off. Their faces seemed as though they were molded from wet clay by a person who had never before seen a human, only nightmarish images. Their mail was covered in blood, and some of it was black from where it had oozed from the creatures themselves.

One of the beasts let out a roar, almost a battle cry, and brandished his sword. His ugly, twisted face grinned at them, leering like a fire-blackened skull. More than twenty of the creatures leaped from the darkened trees beside the road.

"Are you going to help or just stand around?" Dane demanded, eyes determined despite the tremor in his voice. He had produced a sword from somewhere. Rebeka took a deep breath and nodded.

Dane let out a fearsome roar, charging with sword drawn as if he truly was the hero of legend. Rebeka saw his sword connect with rotting flesh before her work began. She incapacitated the leader with a frost spell and a burst of lightning before turning to the two squat creatures trying to circle Dane. He barely noticed one crumple in terror before he whirled and lopped the head off the second.

Rebeka took a deep breath, her mind skipping over the gore flying through the air, and cast a Walking Bomb spell on a tall creature wielding a longsword. The thing cried out in pain and began clawing at its chest. She shocked it twice, rapid fire, before Dane's sword sank into its chest. It exploded in a cloud of black blood and purplish flesh that instantly dropped three other creatures.

"Dane!" a female voice screamed. Rebeka whirled to see the wagon under attack. The beasts had swarmed from the woods on both sides of the road, surrounding the lone wagon. The horrific creatures cackled with glee as they ran Jon through, his blood pooling around the swords as he crumpled to his knees. A grinning creature swung, and with a shockingly loud _thwock _his sword connected. Dane let out a savage wail of grief as his father's bald head rolled across the stony ground.

"No!" Rebeka stumbled forward, raising her hands. A fierce stream of lightning erupted from her hands, creating a series of sonic booms that whirled in the air around her. The rotted flesh of the evil creatures began to sizzle from the extreme heat. They died screaming defiantly. Dane whirled into the knot of beasts that had killed his father, screaming incoherently. A rapid blast of Horror spells made it easy, and the creatures' heads began to roll.

Fenna's voice ripped through the air once more. Rebeka, caught up in frying the creatures and helping Dane near the front of the wagon, had forgotten about the children in the back. She sprinted forward, moving on the opposite side of the wagon as Dane.

"No! You won't touch them, you monsters!" A dark haired woman writhed and struggled in the grip of the creatures. One shrieked as Dane ran it through. Another lost focus on Fenna as it felt the Walking Bomb beneath its skin. But there were too many. Fenna screamed as they dragged her off. Dane's face was twisted in pure anguish as he hesitated.

One of the monsters reached a rotting hand into the wagon and came out with a small boy's neck in its grasp. It locked eyes with Rebeka and joyfully slit Ryan's throat.

A scream tore its way out of her then, despite her resolve to not let emotion rule her. Pure rage and grief flooded her veins, blurring the edges of her vision. A shock of Fade-enhanced energy ripped through the air around her. The monstrous things flew off their feet, bones crumpled from the impact. Dane began to run off after his mother, but the things were too quick. Rebeka couldn't even see her anymore, not sure if her screams were real or just the memory echoing in her tired, adrenaline high head.

"Where's Saige?" Her bones froze with fear at the thought. Dane's dark eyes connected with hers. They reflected the same mind-numbing fear she felt. "Where is she, where'd she go?" Rebeka cried desperately. A spray of ice shards flew around her as she whirled. Dane leaped to the attack.

"No!" Dane fell to his knees. His voice sounded broken. With some surprise, Rebeka looked around and saw that all the creatures were either dead or… gone. She shied away from even thinking about what they were going to do to Fenna. _That sweet, wonderful woman_, she thought. Rebeka wanted to sit down and cry.

Broken sobs came from the ground below her. As if in a dream, Rebeka looked down.

Dane clutched a tiny form in his arms. Her little dress was stained red with blood. Gore was spattered on her unmoving face. A gaping, bloody hole was torn in the middle of her chest, as though a sword was repeatedly stabbed through her.

Rebeka looked away, torn with anguish at the sight. Her eyes chanced upon a tiny doll, trampled in the mud. She wiped off its face, and in the light of the setting sun, handed it to the heartbroken boy beside her.

His body shook from the force of his grief. Rebeka laid a hand on his shoulder.

"Get away from me," he snarled, turning red rimmed eyes on the mage. His face was streaked with tears. "I told you, didn't I? You brought this upon us! Get away from me, you mage abomination!" Rebeka felt her eyes begin to sting with tears.

"Dane…" He turned back to the tiny, bloodstained form in his arms.

"Just go," he whispered.

Rebeka stilled her trembling chin and closed her eyes, stumbling over the corpses of rotting monsters. A shiny bald head caught the red light of the shimmering sun, but Rebeka ran past, unseeing.

Dane's keening sobs followed her down the road as she fled from the bloody sunset.

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><p><strong>So, I felt pretty good about this chapter. I hope you enjoyed? I know I'm being mean to poor Beka right now, but just wait! We may even see some plot begin to sprout in the next chapter! It's such a difficult specimen to cultivate, but I think I may be able to manage... ;)<strong>

**Anyways, R&R please! Your input is greatly appreciated!**


	6. Chapter 6

**Well, it's been forever and a day since I've updated. Sorry about that, folks. My muse went on vacation without me and didn't even bring back a t shirt. Before I forget, though, I just wanted to say how grateful I am to everyone who has read, reviewed, lurked, and alerted. It really makes my day to know that people are out there enjoying my work.**

**Anyways, here is the chapter!**

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><p>~O~<p>

Chapter Six: Sine Adfectu

Rebeka traveled up the Imperial Highway, pale gray stone smacking against her poorly clad feet at every step. The small slapping noises traveled up the stone arches and columns, seeming to echo around her. The air was deathly still. Not a single twitter of birdsong floated upon the heavy air.

She was tired and hungry and alone. Again. And her heart felt close to breaking every time she thought about Dane and his family. _No emotion_, she reminded herself. _Don't lose control._

The road around her was empty. The wagons had all split off or come through earlier in the day. She supposed that oxen, however heavily laden, were faster than a tired, hungry girl plodding along on foot. Her only consolation was that she had turned north not long ago. Lothering couldn't be far now.

She heard bawdy laughter up ahead, and a jingle of metal on metal. Rebeka would know that sound anywhere. _Armor_. Sure enough, a group of men guarding a roadblock appeared, like the scene from her nightmares. The demon continued to torture her with it, capturing her and forcing her to watch the murder over and over again. She smiled grimly. _At least it doesn't know about…_ She took a constricted breath and shook her head. She wasn't thinking about that. Her dark blue eyes scanned the men ahead of her sharply. She considered getting off of the Highway, but she saw that it was a twenty foot drop at the very least on either side. That wasn't going to happen.

Rebeka wanted to sigh again, but didn't. She was just going to have to walk up to them and see what would happen.

"Why hello there, missy," one of the greasy men said once she was a few yards from them. She didn't respond right away. The leader was a small man with a hooked nose. His cheeks were bristling with rough stubble, and his dark, lank hair drooped from his forehead. Rebeka noticed that his leathers were better taken care of than those bandits on the road. _Hooray for small victories_, Rebeka thought with a touch of sarcasm.

"Ten silvers to pass the bridge," he offered after a long silence. His only response was the slight arch of an eyebrow. A giant of a man shifted behind the leader, his leathers clicking and creaking loudly.

"Do ya think she heard you?" he asked, his dull-witted voice booming across the distance between them. The leader hissed for him to shut up.

"Like I said, ten silvers to pass the bridge. No toll, no passage." Rebeka breathed in, deeply and calmingly, then stared into his eyes icily.

"This is a toll, is it?" she asked, plowing ahead despite his eager nod. "Funny, I've never met bandits who claim to be civil servants." The others in his group put their hands on the pommels of their daggers. She saw one with a crossbow and made a note of it. She'd have to take care of him quickly if they fought.

"Who said anything about us being bandits?" the leader asked, his hands spread wide in a placating gesture, taking a few steps forward.

Rebeka was tired and cold and hungry. She had had just about enough. "Do I appear to you to be a person with means enough to be giving coin away to suspicious strangers?"

The bandit's eyes narrowed. "Now listen here," he began and his voice was no longer placating.

"I have had enough with bandits and thieves and killers. I am weary to the _bone_ of this. Let me pass." Rebeka's voice had lost all of its serenity. It was icy cold, cutting through the air like a blade. The lead bandit's eyes narrowed.

"No toll, no passage," he repeated, and his voice was menacing.

Rebeka breathed in and out, controlling her anger and frustration. "We'll see."

Rebeka didn't move an inch, but her mind whipped into action. Before they could react, a Sleep spell caused the crossbowman to crumple in a delicate snooze, and an arcane bolt and a quick Frost spell zapping the man circling around her. A Crushing Prison encased the huge man, squeezing around his gigantic ribs in an invisible cage. The leader glanced around, his eyes widening as his men winced and tumbled to the ground supposedly without cause. His incredulous gaze switched back to the slim girl in front of him. Her expressionless eyes were the last thing he saw before he too crumpled to the ground. Rebeka focused on the two others and cast a deep sleep on them as well, letting up on the other enchantments once they were snoring.

She looked over her work approvingly. No deaths, no injuries. The large man would be sore for a few days, and the other man would have a bruise on his chest. _Better than they deserved,_ she thought, trying to stamp out the spite she felt slinking through her heart.

The way into Lothering was clear, for now. Rebeka set off past the roadblock and down into the rural little town.

~O~

Rebeka kept her gaze on the ground as she once again began to plod. She would have to find some sort of job to do, she realized. There was no other way to get money for food. That left two options. The Chanters' Board, or asking refugees on the street for a job. With the templars after her, she couldn't do either.

_Speaking of which,_ Rebeka thought wryly as she plodded dejectedly past a templar clad in his full uniform plate. The man's eyes were invisible through the dark eye slit of his helm, but Rebeka couldn't eradicate the paranoia that caused her heart to race. _If he knows who I am…_

Thankfully, her heart stopped pounding as she trudged past him. Rebeka stood for a moment in the middle of the dusty track. Straight ahead was the Chantry, full of templars and sisters and mothers and priests. There was no way she was heading in that direction. To her left was a bridge leading over the river that bisected the town. _That is the way to go_, she decided.

Rebeka hadn't gotten more than twenty feet before a plump, pink robed woman was bustling over, exclaiming, "Oh, you poor dear! Come with me, you look like you need food and rest." Rebeka fought the impulse to groan in despair. The sister locked onto her arm like a leech and wouldn't let go, dragging her unwilling captive towards the stocky stone building that spelled Rebeka's doom.

In the bustling courtyard was a mess of refugees. They milled about restlessly, waiting for room inside and help from the members of the Chantry. Rebeka leaned in, however, noticing a clump of refugees gathered around a man. He seemed to be yelling and pacing. The sister clucked disapprovingly. "I wish Ser Bryant would get that poor man out of here so he doesn't start a panic." Rebeka tried to disengage herself from the sister, who still had a death grip on her arm, but to no avail. Her heart began to thump loudly in her chest as she passed through the great oak doors of the Chantry. Rebeka focused on taking deep, quiet breaths through the nose to calm herself.

The wide, utilitarian hall of the Chantry was as packed with refugees as the courtyard outside. People milled about near candelabras and tables with books—_which few of the refugees can read, I don't doubt_, thought Rebeka, trying to quash her disdain. Pink robed Chantry members bustled about, offering words of comfort or religious passages to ease the minds of the fearful people.

Every armored person in the room made Rebeka's heart leap inside her chest. She clamped an iron will down on the fear. A silver clad knight was conferring with two others, all three with the flaming Sword of Andraste stamped on their chests. Another man was standing in the shadows with a thick tome spread on a table. _Not a templar, then_, she thought, observing the dark chainmail and lack of helm. The sister marched right by them all.

She turned right and walked towards a dark corner. Rebeka's eyes kept darting about, trying to keep everything in her sight. She felt like she was cornered in a den of wolves. Her heart began to race again before she could stop it. _No emotion_, she reminded herself.

The sister unlocked a small closet and began to rummage. "My dear, it is absolutely scandalous for you to be seen in those! That must be men's clothing. Andraste have mercy, I will not send a young lady out dressed in some man's old rags," she muttered as she sorted through various boxes. "Aha!" The exclamation once again dragged Rebeka's attention to the plump sister in front of her. The mousy brown head straightened up. She held a dress and a shawl in her hands. Rebeka tried to imagine herself in those. It was ridiculous, to be frank.

She shook her head, a false rueful smile plastered on her face. "I'm sorry, sister. I can't possibly take those. Perhaps a new shirt? I will repay you," Rebeka promised. The plump sister in front of her huffed and shook her head.

"You're all the same, you refugees," the opinionated woman said in an irritated, yet somehow affectionate, tone. "It's called charity, and I'm giving you some whether you like it or not. I can't let a pretty girl go out there so unkempt, and you're hungry too, I'll wager."

The loud gurgle from Rebeka's stomach answered eloquently. The woman laughed and produced a hunk of bread and cheese from somewhere. _Now _that_ is magic,_ Rebeka thought. She took the proffered food. "Now you go wait out back, dear, and I'll get you that _shirt_ you asked for." She bustled away, grumbling something about society these days. Rebeka followed where the woman had pointed and found herself in a small garden nestled between the Chantry and the hills behind.

She found that her heart rate slowed when she was out of the building. There was no way to hide from templars in there, none at all. It was enough to make Rebeka feel sick.

The garden was still lovely, despite the winter chill and the encroaching Blight. The plants were green and neat, little buds and leaves still clinging to them. Some flowers, unaware or uncaring that they were in the wrong season, seemed to grin from creeping vines. The place was still alive.

Except for one bush in the corner. The small, stunted thing was brown and withered, the thorns still baring their teeth from the desiccated stems marking it as a rosebush. Rebeka looked into the dark, twisted vines and felt a shiver of discomfort.

She sat down on a bench in a shadowed corner, still contemplating the dead rosebush. Another sister came out to the garden, oblivious to the girl hidden in the darkness. Her red hair gleamed in the watery sunlight. The two women sat, staring at a dead rosebush as though it held answers to their questions.

The plump, busy, rosy cheeked sister popped her head out the back door. "I have some new clothes for you, dear. Come on inside," she said gently. Rebeka stood to go, glancing one last time at the dead rosebush. Her heart felt a sting of pain before she shut the feeling down.

The rosebush was like her, she'd realized. And there was nothing anyone could do to change the fate of either.

_No emotion_, she thought dully.

~O~

Rebeka's heart beat a quick, steady rhythm as she walked down the long hall that led out of the Chantry. The oppressive, dark stone seemed to be closing in around her, and the templars looked ever more menacing each second she spent within their view.

But the sister had walked with her down the hall, patted her on the back, and chirped a cheery farewell, and Rebeka was sad to see her go. The woman had left Rebeka with a new change of clothes, a full stomach, and a small pouch of copper bits. Rebeka didn't try to suppress her gratitude.

This time she made it across the bridge. There was a group of tents outside a thick, sturdy inn. Rebeka made her way towards it, finally allowing her mind to drift carefully across the events of the previous day.

The word Blight had been echoing around her since she'd gotten into Lothering. She knew what that meant. The books and stories about the Gray Wardens had captivated her: glorious heroes charging into battle on griffon-back, who held duty and honor above all else, fighting the creatures of darkness so that the rest of mankind could live in peace. After seeing darkspawn, she finally understood just how grateful the world should be to them for taking on that duty. The descriptions of the foul creatures, the darkspawn, had been so grotesque as to seem implausible. But now, Rebeka had fought them had seen what they looked like and were capable of doing. An image of a small figure with a half dozen holes through her chest flashed through Rebeka's mind.

She shook her head, clearing out the clutter of her musings. Another deep breath, and she put everything in order. _No emotion_. It was becoming like a chant to her now. She entered the inn and gave the innkeeper all her coppers for a spot on the floor. Every corner of the town was crowded to overflowing with people coming up from the south.

Rebeka lay on her patch of floor, listening to the buzz of people around her as they muttered and mumbled and got themselves drunk off the innkeeper's ale. _Ostagar fell_, some murmured. _The king is dead_, they whispered. Rebeka sank into sleep.

~O~

"If I don't give in, what happens?" she asked brazenly. The pride demon considered her face for a moment, as though she were some trinket he thought might look nice pinned to his robes.

"You will, one way or another. I'm trying to be gentle, you see," he explained, his blood colored eyes malicious.

"Would you fight me? Is that how it works?"

"For most," he replied, his eyes appraising.

"But not me," she said. The air around her turned hazy for a moment before it cleared.

"Careful, child. Emotions are real here, not physical objects."

Rebeka laughed, a humorless bark that was more a release of tension than emotion. "You think I am unaware of this, demon?" she asked, her voice icy but calm.

The demon dipped his crowned head. "Review is never remiss," he said mildly. Rebeka wished she could laugh at the absurdity of it all, of a demon teaching her how to control her mind.

"It's because I'm as powerful here as you are, isn't it?" she mused. The pride demon's eyes narrowed. Rebeka felt a small drop of relief and triumph flicker in her heart. _I don't need to be so afraid_, she realized. But then she noticed the small half smile dancing on the demon's face and she hid her thoughts. _I cannot fight a pride demon with pride_, she decided.

"I am done tonight, demon," Rebeka announced. The demon nodded its head, looking furious at being left behind so ignominiously. Rebeka smiled grimly and pulled her spirit back to her body. Her eyes opened.

She left the inn quietly, in the predawn hours. She made her way out of Lothering, hardly seeing the cage to her left as she passed through the morning mists. A huge, dark shadow was huddled inside. Rebeka didn't stop to find out what it was, pressing forward. The Imperial Highway beckoned once more.

~O~

_Lothering: Pretty as a painting. Its outskirts? Not so much_, Alistair thought, slashing his way through yet another marauding group of darkspawn. After a group of bandits who refused to listen to reason, a group of refugees turned bounty hunters, and the bears, wolves, and whatever else they'd slain in that Maker-forsaken town, it was darkspawn. _At least this time what we're fighting is in my job description_,he thought wryly as he bashed a genlock in the face with his shield.

He glanced over to see Elissa carving her way through the hurlock Alpha. The archer fell to a clump of arrows in its chest and a crackle of lightning. Sten was already cleaning his blade. Alistair paused. Fighting went much faster with six than it did with four. Elissa's mabari trotted up and gave her a big sloppy kiss. She laughed.

"Down, Nemesis, down boy," she said, chuckling as she pushed the enormous dog away. Then she straightened, her green eyes sparkling and went over to shake hands with the dwarven merchant they'd just saved. Alistair hung back and took care of his weapon. He wasn't good at conversation—at least, not the diplomatic and helpful kind. He would leave that to the noble in the group. Alistair watched as his fellow Warden grinned, shook his hand again, and they were free to go on their way again.

"So what did he say?" Alistair asked, falling in beside her. Elissa's red hair gleamed in the sunlight, curling around her face like fire.

"Oh, he just thanked us for saving him and said we were too dangerous for the likes of him," she said. "The usual, I suppose." Alistair chuckled.

"At least he thanked us, that one is new," he retorted. Elissa rolled her eyes with a smile.

"I think we can make a few more hours of travel today. Let's keep walking and see if there's a good camping spot strikes our fancy," she said, glancing at the Warden walking next to her. Alistair nodded his agreement. _I'm glad she's the one leading. She's better at it than I could ever be. _

They had only walked a few hundred yards when they came to a spot in the Highway that was completely split. Rubble didn't even halfway fill the gap.

"'Tis a fine road, that crumbles in the middle. Your humans are even duller than I had suspected, if you think this road is a superior work of craftsmanship," came Morrigan's snide voice. Alistair felt a stab of dislike for the woman.

"It used to be nicer," Elissa explained lightly. "I suppose we must leave this lovely dry walkway. Mud, here we come!" And so saying, the red haired Warden leaped off the highway and skidded down the loosely piled rubble. "Well, come on then! What are you all waiting for?"

Alistair nearly grinned and executed the same flying leap down the hill. At the last moment, though, his foot struck a rock and his balance was toppled, leaving him tumbling down the rubble that Elissa had skidded down so gracefully. Alistair felt his heart sink as the sniggers rolled down behind him. _Can I just lay here?_ he wondered as he came to a stop on his back. He could feel the heat radiating from his cheeks.

A shiny gray gauntlet entered his field of vision. "Come on," Elissa said with an encouraging smile. "It wasn't that bad."

Looking at all the dust and scratches in his armor, Alistair slumped. "Liar," he accused. He began to dust himself off as Sten and Morrigan began to pick their way down the rubble and Daffodil skidded the whole way on his bottom. _Where's Leliana?_ he wondered, then spotted her. The pink robed sister was jumping from rock to rock like some sort of mountain goat.

"Come on," Elissa repeated. "We need to get moving if we're to find a place to camp before sundown." She set off down the road, avoiding the deep ruts carved into it. Alistair followed and felt another smile trying to emerge. Things might not be as hopeless as they seemed, with her to lead them.

~O~

The sun was dipping near the horizon when Alistair felt an unpleasant tingle in his blood. The itching, prickling sensation could only mean one thing, and he saw by the way Elissa stiffened that she felt it too.

"Darkspawn up ahead," she told the others quietly. They readied their weapons and moved forward quickly.

There were at least a dozen milling about. It looked like a raiding party, and the closer Alistair got, the more his blood prickled in his veins. He blinked as he felt a slight itch behind his eyes. "Emissary," he said to Elissa. She nodded.

Elissa called a fearsome war cry. Alistair's heart leaped to the challenge. He charged to meet them head on, screaming taunts. The mindless beasts fixed their empty, dead gazes on him and charged, swinging their rusting, tainted swords. Alistair ducked and parried and lunged, his templar training kicking in. A gurgling cry from a few yards away told him the emissary was down. Elissa rejoined the fray, weaving around arrows and spells and the giant Qunari warrior more gracefully than any swordsman Alistair had ever seen.

Suddenly, the prickling in Alistair's blood started up again, so strongly he nearly stumbled. A hurlock dressed in fine armor crested a hill and screamed for blood. Another swarm of darkspawn descended upon them.

A hurlock exploded into a vile array of blood and gore, spattering those near Alistair and causing them to writhe in pain. _Morrigan is going to pay for that disgusting trick_, Alistair vowed as he hacked a genlock's head from its shoulders and trying not to think about how he was _dripping_. A sudden crack of electricity made the hair stand up on the back of his neck, and he realized that Morrigan was freezing a genlock on the other side of the battle field. _What the…? _The remaining five or so darkspawn crumpled to the ground, twitching, before they exploded into showers of gore, like that other darkspawn had.

Elissa looked around, her green eyes on the alert for another enemy. Alistair sensed the crackle of magic and looked down the road.

"Stop there," Elissa called, her voice carrying across the distance. The slim figure standing on the road complied.

Alistair followed Elissa as she walked towards this unknown mage. The rest of their party fell in behind them. Nemesis trotted along happily, his fur splattered with blood and darkspawn bits, his tongue lolling out of his mouth like this was the best day ever for the dog.

The girl standing on the road had her arms hanging loosely at her sides, no staff, wand, or robes to identify her as a mage, yet there was a subtle crackling in the air around her that told Alistair that she was using magic. Her hair was tangled and matted, as though she hadn't combed it in days. Her clothes were equally unkempt, splattered with gore and black stains that could have been darkspawn blood. Her eyes were a dark shade of blue, and she had puffy, dark circles under her them from lack of sleep.

"Who are you?" Elissa asked. Her green eyes were suspicious, and rightly so, in Alistair's opinion.

The girl considered for a moment, before saying, "My name is Rebeka Chayse." Her voice was dull, expressionless.

Elissa dipped her head courteously. "I am Elissa Cousland, Gray Warden. It's a pleasure to meet you." The girl returned the nod coldly.

"You're an apostate," Alistair accused. The girl's dark eyes flicked to him.

"You're a templar," she returned. "Please stop trying to drain my mana. It will only give you a headache."

Alistair's eyes bugged for a moment. _How did she…? _He complied with her request. Elissa was watching the two of them with guarded green eyes.

"I apologize for detaining you, Warden Elissa," the girl said, her gaze back on the noble. She nodded a farewell and turned to walk down the road.

"Wait!" Elissa's voice sparked across the air. The girl paused. "I could use another fighter, and you've proven you can handle darkspawn. Join us. Help us fight the Blight." Alistair's eyes widened in outrage. He barely noticed the girl stopping.

"Elissa, we've already got one apostate in our group. Do we need to harbor another?"

Elissa met his stare coolly. "She's skilled. Would you rather hand her over to the Chantry for execution?" Alistair gaped.

The girl, Rebeka, he remembered after a moment, walked back to them. "You're inviting me to fight darkspawn?" she asked, her eyes sparking with the first emotion Alistair had seen from her yet. It sent a shiver down his spine, that dark hatred. It was there for only the slightest moment and then vanished as she straightened. Elissa nodded. Alistair still wasn't sure he approved.

"I accept you offer, then, Warden Elissa," she said formally. Alistair sighed. _And now we have yet _another_ crazy to add to the growing list._

* * *

><p><strong>Ooo, and now Rebeka's with the Wardens. What will happen now? <strong>

**R&R please, I do so enjoy reading your feedback!**


	7. Chapter 7

~O~

Chapter Seven: Tantibus

It was nearing dark before the Grey Wardens' group finally picked a camping spot not far from a small pond. Camp was set up quickly, reminding Rebeka, with a painful squeeze of her heart, how efficient Jon and Fenna had been. She didn't know what to do with herself.

The fiery haired Warden, Elissa... something or other… noticed her discomfort. She pressed a bundle into the mage's hands and pointed through the trees to the pond. "Go wash up," she commanded gently. Rebeka measured her with a gaze for a moment before nodding and padding through the deepening twilight.

The mage was quick and efficient, and though she didn't admit it, it felt lovely to get the days of sweat and grime off of her. She discovered that the bundle was a tunic and pair of breeches, made for a woman a bit larger and more muscular than her but of a good material and better fitting than the clothes she'd gotten from the chantry in Lothering. She slipped the items on and gathered the surprisingly high-quality soap in her hands. The Warden would be wanting it back. She twisted through the trees, feeling the chill of the night even more acutely now that her hair was soaking wet. The crackling of a large fire met her ears as she emerged into the camp.

Everyone was gathered around a large pot except the scantily clothed witch. Rebeka glanced for her and wondered why she was camped so far from everyone else. She could make out a shadowed form huddled near a tent. The witch seemed so lonely… Rebeka shook her head to clear it of such useless thoughts. Forming attachments to these people would be pointless once they found out about her strange magic.

She walked over to where the others were gathered and quietly ladled herself a bowl of stew from the giant pot. The strange group was sprawled out all around the fire, slurping away at the mixture. "This is wonderful, Leliana," the templar said between bites. A red haired woman wearing Chantry robes smiled at him. Sarcasm welled up, unbidden, within Rebeka as she thought to herself, _An apostate, a templar, and a Chantry sister walk into a bar…_

"I'm glad you like it, Alistair," the Chantry sister—Leliana—said to the templar in a very Orlesian accent. Her blue eyes sparkled over the rest of them, including the very large dog lying next to the Warden. Rebeka sat silent next to the giant Qunari warrior. If they wanted conversation, it certainly wasn't going to come from her. The dog whined and looked up at the Warden, who sighed.

"You're right, Nem," she muttered to the mabari. "We should turn in. I'll take first watch with Sten." Everyone except Rebeka nodded at that. _Like, sentinels? _Rebeka wondered. She cursed her sheltered Tower upbringing. _Who's going second then?_ Being surrounded by soldiers was annoying… _No emotion_, she reminded herself. Rebeka crawled into the tent she'd been allotted and dropped asleep, too weary to even bother worrying about the demons.

~O~

The Fade made misty swirls around Rebeka, not bothering to resolve itself as it waited for her fancy. It was funny, how much like a living thing it was at times. For a little while, Rebeka floated in the cool fog. It was peaceful. Tranquil.

A fist squeezed Rebeka's heart and she _slammed_ the Fade into a shape, any shape. Which just so happened to be the Tower.

"I have demons, I shouldn't need to make my _own_ nightmares," she muttered to herself. A husky laugh rippled through the Fade behind her. Rebeka rolled her eyes and dropped the pair of them into the night sky as she turned on her familiar purple-skinned desire demon.

"Hello," she said gracelessly. _At least it isn't Pride_, she thought. When had she started naming her demons?

The chips of obsidian the demon passed for eyes crinkled in an alluring smile, though Rebeka felt no attraction to it. "Hello to you too, Serrah Charming," she replied. Rebeka didn't answer. The desire demon glanced around curiously at their surroundings. "Not very interesting tonight…"

"Are you going to cut to the chase anytime soon?"

"I'm hurt, here I thought we were friends," the demon pouted. Rebeka put her hands on her hips.

"Well to tell you the truth, Lust and I were settling a debt. She bet me an Antivan merchant and a Rivaini stable boy that the pride demon had started battering at you, but I know him, he's a bit more… subtle."

Rebeka considered that for a moment. "You demons have separate names?" She couldn't be sure, but she thought the demon had just rolled her eyes.

"Of course, mageling. You haven't seen ten different 'Valor' spirits running around have you? Fade, that would be annoying," she muttered as an aside. "Anyways, demons are the same, just a little more _ambitious_."

"Oh, so that's what you're calling it these days."

The demoness _harrumphed_. "Infuriating mage, not even using her magic correctly…"

Rebeka's eyebrows jumped up at that. The raw Fade misted into being around them as she paced forward. "What did you say?" The demon's face grew very _innocent_. "What did you mean, 'using my magic correctly'?"

The demon shrugged nonchalantly. "Oh nothing, it needn't trouble you…" Rebeka felt the air grow a hazy red as she contemplated ripping the smug demon's horns off. _No emotion, no emotion,_ she quickly chanted. The demon was so smug. She took a deep breath.

"Never mind then. I'm sure I'll figure it out," she said, shrugging just as nonchalantly as the desire demon had. A thought occurred to her. "Say, have you managed to grow an imagination yet?" she asked, forcing her lips to stay in a straight line. Indignation bloomed across the demon's face. "No? Pity."

Rebeka summoned a few massive boulders from the raw Fade with a flicker of thought and climbed a bridge back into the misty, irresolute version of the Fade she'd found so peaceful at the beginning of this whole dream. Just floating there, she became aware of a bone-wrenching _tiredness_. How long had it been since she'd really had a full night's sleep? Her mind games with the demons didn't count as rest, that was for sure. Ever since she'd left the Tower… no, it was after that. The corners of Rebeka's mouth turned down in a frown. _Ever since that pride demon_, she realized.

A sound rang through the still, misty Fade. Rebeka shivered, her ears pricking to catch it again. There! The sound—she thought it sounded like the ringing of a finger swirled around the top of a wine glass, or a very deep glass bell—rippled through the air again. Where was it coming from? Rebeka struggled to turn in the formless air of the Fade. Her eyes narrowed; was that a light? Yes, she thought it was, just pulsing there amidst the Fade. She conjured a glass walkway towards the light.

Rebeka grunted as she shoved forward. When did air get so _heavy_? It felt like she was shoving against the Tower's entire collection of library books and a few tables. But the light just kept pulsing, and she could swear it was growing closer the more she shoved.

"Woah!" Her shout rang out as the barrier gave way. She stumbled, only to catch herself on a desiccated, withered shrub. Her eyes widened and then narrowed as she beheld the vista she'd blundered into. Spread out before her was a wide plain of dun earth, cracked and dry. In the distance, a line of mountains spread like dark sentinels. Blackness seemed to creep in from every crevice. A small figure stood a few yards away with a sword in hand, golden hair glinting in the watery light of the Fade. Rebeka paced forward, curiosity nipping at her heels.

A thunderous noise rang out beneath their feet. The figure turned and frowned. "What—?" A rotted hand thrust itself out of the ground, causing the templar to leap back. In his haste to hack at the hand he forgot all about the wayward mage. Rebeka glanced around and felt a dawning horror and seething rage as she realized what was happening. _Darkspawn attack_, she knew. They were springing up from the ground like undead, swarming around. The air grew thick and muggy with a _corruption_ that seemed to spring from their very flesh. The templar-Warden continued hacking at the 'spawn as they advanced, howling and screaming.

_So this is his nightmare?_ Rebeka thought. She wanted to be sick. She wanted to join in dismembering them.

Above the frenzy, a great roar rang out, equal parts scream and throaty growl. Rebeka clapped her hands over her ears and stared at the muggy green sky. Her heart seemed to freeze as a massive dragon swooped over their heads and unleashed a torrent of purple flame.

She glanced once at the templar-Warden's horrified face before the dream collapsed and Rebeka found herself plummeting through the Fade.

* * *

><p><strong>Please review!<strong>


	8. Chapter 8

~O~

Chapter Eight: Poena

It was still dark out when Rebeka jerked awake and shivered. She'd never _fallen_ in the Fade before. It…hadn't been pleasant. Outside the thin canvas walls of the tent, she could hear the sounds of people in armor shuffling about as quietly as possible—though that wasn't saying much.

She didn't sleep again that night. _Fear will make me demon-food,_ she scolded herself.

Finally, light peeked into her tent. She rolled to her feet and slipped out.

Somehow, she was not the first one up. The red-haired Warden Elissa sat by a large cast-iron pot stirring something that looked gray and goopy but smelled surprisingly appetizing. She glanced at the Rebeka as the mage wandered nearer.

"Morning," she greeted. A bubble popped wetly in the pot. Rebeka nodded politely. The Warden scooped up a bowl of the stuff and handed it to the mage. "Porridge," Elissa said. So _that's _what was in the pot.

"Thanks," Rebeka said quietly. She took a bite.

"You don't say much, do you?"

Rebeka glanced up at the Warden, who was gazing at her with curious green eyes. "I'm a tad more verbose with my friends," she replied, and ate another spoonful of the gloopy porridge.

"Really? What are they like?"

Rebeka met the Warden's eyes, considered for a moment, and then swallowed a third bite of porridge. "I'd rather not talk about it."

They fell back into silence as the others trailed sleepily from their tents.

Later that morning, Rebeka found herself plodding once more down a dusty road, except this time she was weighed down with a pack filled with food, spare bits of armor, and her blankets. It was murder on her legs, considering she'd never had to carry more than ten pounds' worth of anything before. It didn't help that it was unseasonably muggy. The pack clattered noisily as she tried to find a comfortable way to carry the weight.

"Are you alright?" the lilting accent of the Chantry sister fluted. Rebeka glanced at the redhead and nodded. She didn't need help.

"You're sure? You look a little fatigued," the sister pressed. The mage pressed her lips together and wrapped a rejuvenation spell around herself. Her energy returned instantly.

"I'm fit as a fiddle," Rebeka replied with false cheer. She grinned for effect and then sped up to leave the sister behind. Why was she here? She could kill darkspawn on her own, couldn't she? Rebeka hoisted her pack again. And why did traveling involve carrying so much stuff? She could feel her irritation boiling up inside her and tamped it back down before she did something stupid.

The back of her mind had been prickling ever since she woke up, like there was something on the tip of her tongue that she was trying to remember, except she knew there wasn't. The half-remembered not-thoughts were giving her a headache. None of this was helping her mood.

The templar was staring at her again.

"Can I help you?" she ground out. The man's armor against the ground made a disturbingly familiar _clank_ each time he took a step.

"I…" he was blushing furiously.

"Oh, you're one of _those_," Rebecca muttered.

"I beg your pardon?"

"You remind me of a templar I know."

"Oh."

Rebeka could feel her heart rate increasing steadily the longer he walked near her. He was slightly behind her, ready for the worst, just like any templar. There was obviously something on his mind, but Rebeka just didn't care. _Just let me walk in peace,_ she thought grumpily.

Her wish was granted. She sighed with relief.

~O~

They managed somehow to make it through an entire day and make camp without encountering a single group of darkspawn. Rebeka found that to be less than fantastic. She and the Qunari giant were the only ones who did.

As soon as all the equipment was stowed, Elissa broke out a collection of detailed maps, each made of high quality, soft vellum. She laid them gently across the flat ground near the fire.

"We're heading to Redcliffe first," she said, pointing to a little symbol at the bottom of Lake Calenhad. "And we should be around here somewhere." She pointed to a spot an inch or two away. "If we push hard we should be there by late tomorrow, or the day after."

The Qunari spoke up. "The darkspawn are to the south, are they not?"

Elissa nodded.

"Then why do we travel west?"

The fiery haired Warden swept her eyes up and down the giant and seemed to find him wanting. "I'm sure the Qunari understand the tactical advantage of not being outnumbered a hundred to one by their enemies, correct?"

The Chantry sister seemed to approve of the plan, as did the templar. Morrigan had no opinion to offer, and neither did Rebeka. The Warden seemed to have things well in hand. The group dispersed to their tents after drawing straws for watch.

"It's you and me, kid," Elissa said tiredly. She chose one side of the fire and Rebeka chose the other, each staring into the darkness. Minutes passed.

"You can't be that old."

Elissa twisted around to stare at the mage.

"You called me kid. I'm not that much younger than you."

"Oh. I… feel older than I look, I suppose." She turned away again. "It's been a long month." Rebeka could hear the shadows in her voice.

"That's probably true for us all," the mage replied quietly. Elissa didn't seem to hear, and the rest of the watch passed in silence. Rebeka was sad for it to end, especially since it meant having to try sleeping. She pushed into the tiny tent and dropped into her bedroll. She drifted off in seconds.

~O~

Rebeka opened her eyes in a forest of pure white columns, rising to a distant gray roof. There were no torches for light, but she could see perfectly in a small radius before the columns faded and became indistinct. The still air reminded her of an ancient library, or a mausoleum. The confusing mosaics on the tile floor struck her as being very Tevinter.

"Why can I never actually sleep when I go to sleep?" she complained to the still air.

"Comes with the territory, my dear." The sonorous voice of the pride demon was hardly a shock. Rebeka could feel the air thrumming with low crystalline ringing again, and something deeper that tasted like the color red.

"Turns out you're quite notorious around here."

"You should feel honored then."

Rebeka shivered; it was something about that voice. "What are you here for again?" The Fade thrummed with her nervousness. A wisp materialized through the floor, attracted to the emotion. _Calm down_, she commanded herself. The taste of red intensified on her tongue.

"I was hoping my friends could help persuade you to my point of view." His blood red eyes glowed like the sun for a moment. The wisp let out a high pitched hiss and dissolved. Rebeka felt her whole world go red. "What—?" And suddenly she smelled fire and felt waves of anger and frustration slam into her soul.

Rage demons were behind her. No problem. No problem. She fought to stay calm. The rage tugged at her consciousness, completely unbridled. She twisted the Fade around her and emerged behind the demons. Ice shot from her fingers.

"That takes care of that." She smirked in Pride's direction. He smirked back.

Red roared over her senses. She was blind, deaf, drowning in hatred that pounded at the fabric of her mind. Ice lashed out from her body. Her vision was slowly returning. She ducked and tried to leap through the Fade again, but something was holding her power captive. _Peaceful, no emotion_, she ordered her brain. Rage spiked through her as she met the glowing eyes of one of the _army_ of demons surrounding her.

"This would be easier if you would give me what I want, child," the mild voice fluted over the snarling rage demons. Rebeka screamed as they wrapped their burning arms around her. The edges of her body were starting to fade. The pain lanced out of her body and ripped holes in the Fade, and her scream went on and on and on…

~O~

… And on and on, and then she finally registered the hands that were shaking her. She leaped back, wrenching out of their grip.

"Put the lightning down, mage."

The templar was glancing nervously at the sparks leaping across her palms.

"What do you want?" Her voice sounded raw.

"Well for one thing, it might be nice if you'd stop all the yelling." The embers of the fire were casting his face into shadow. She let the little crackles of lightning still gathered in her hands tell him what she thought of that.

"Templars have no trouble running through mages who dream like that, you know," he continued inanely.

"What are you waiting for, then?"

He stiffened, and though she couldn't see his face, she was sure he was wearing a wounded expression. "I'm no templar." He walked back to his tent and paused at the entrance. "If you decide to sleep again, try to keep it down." And then his gilded outline disappeared into the tent.

"Yeah, right." Rebeka stretched out on her back underneath the stars. The memory of the fiery arms of the rage demons kept her awake until dawn.

* * *

><p><em><strong>Please review!<strong>_


	9. Chapter 9

~O~

Chapter Nine: Capitus Dolores

"Ah, Redcliffe, so quaint and yet, aptly named," the Chantry sister sighed dreamily. Elissa nodded and signaled for them to move forward. Rebeka nearly smiled as she saw Leliana trying to shake the red mud off her boots like a disgusted cat. She cast a spell and the mud solidified under the redhead's feet. She walked on without saying a word.

The town was, as Leliana had said, rather quaint. There was a windmill at the top of the hill and from what she could see down the steep slope, all of the houses were small, thatch-roofed things. Some seemed to be built on stilts into the water, steady structures amongst the gently swaying boats. A stone chantry dominated the square.

"Stop, please!" A young man with a bow and a quiver full of arrows thundered across a small bridge towards them. The pounding of the waterfall drowned out the sound of his panting, but his fear and exhaustion were clear anyway.

"What is it?" Elissa demanded.

Panic twisted his face. "You mean you haven't heard?"

Morrigan snorted. "Tis obvious she has not, boy. Answer the question." Elissa shot the witch a glance. The boy didn't notice. He spilled out the rather interesting story of Redcliffe's undead infestation in between nervous pants.

The templar, Alistair, shot Elissa a glance. "We should help them." Morrigan snorted again.

"I agree. Lead the way," the Warden told the boy. He choked out a 'thank you' and took off down the hill, leaving the Wardens to follow behind. He led them past the windmill where a number of men dressed in plate were training for battle. Rebeka scanned their ranks warily as they strode past. Soon enough, however, she was forced to take her eyes off of them and pay attention to the rocky slope beneath her feet. The concept of a paved road was obviously foreign to this little town.

A stone slid loose from under Rebeka's feet. She barely had time to yelp as she felt herself begin to plummet down the hill when the Qunari giant's massive hand encircled her arm like a vise.

"Careful, bas saarebas," he growled. She jerked her arm free and watched his massive back continue down the path.

"Keep up, mage," came a shout from down the hill. Rebeka fought the impulse to growl as well, and followed the group. Where were the darkspawn when she needed them?

The boy led the group right up to the stone Chantry building. Rebeka jumped as a stray arrow whistled by her head. Her irritation was making her palms itch with fire, she had to control it. Deep breaths.

Elissa turned and surveyed her companions. "Alistair, Leliana, Rebeka, come with me. Sten, Morrigan and Nem can wait out here." Rebeka eyed the Warden curiously but otherwise did not comment. Why should Elissa want _her _in there? Elissa left no time for objections. They strode into the Chantry, leaving the boy to follow.

The inside was cool and dark. The pews and other furniture had been shoved haphazardly into one wing of the Chantry and all the bookshelves were in disarray. Frightened townsfolk clustered everywhere, sniffling and rustling around. Elissa glanced around with soft eyes, shaking her head. "These poor people…" Leliana nodded her agreement. Rebeka twitched an eyebrow; the pale faces of the villagers meant little to her, and she to them.

Elissa stopped suddenly. "Is that Teagan?" Rebeka glanced around blankly. The man in the fine clothes? The Warden made a beeline for him, not pausing for him to finish his conversation with the Revered Mother.

"Maker, Teagan, is that really you?"

"Elissa?" His blue eyes widened in shock. "What are you doing here? Why aren't you in Highever?"

Elissa seemed to slump slightly. "You haven't heard. It's… not a happy story Teagan. I'm a Grey Warden now."

Alistair shuffled around uneasily, causing his armor to clink. "Bann Teagan, I don't know if you'll remember me…"

The Bann's tired eyes seemed to light up a little. "Alistair, of course I remember. It would be hard to forget all the muddy footprints you left on Isolde's fancy Orlesian rugs."

Rebeka felt a subtle twinge of exclusion. These people all shared connections that she would never have—Elissa and Alistair obviously knew this man, and Leliana was at least familiar with Orlais. All Rebeka had was a life of imprisonment in the Tower. _Boo hoo, poor sheltered mageling_, she began to scold herself, when a wave of faintness swept over her. She staggered under the force of it. _When was the last time I slept?_ she wondered sluggishly. It didn't matter. She tugged at the Fade and drew a rejuvenation spell into her body. The darkness in her vision abated.

"You don't believe Loghain's lies, then?"

It was difficult to get back into the rapid dialogue between Elissa and this Bann. There were too many politics that Rebeka couldn't grasp. She turned, instead, towards an alcove formed by hastily shoved aside bookshelves.

The children sniffling on the ground and the sister tremulously reading a story didn't concern Rebeka. None of these had the same innocent generosity as Ryan or the same winning shyness as Saige. She browsed the scattered books with one eye on the templar guarding the Chantry's entrance and one eye on the worried gesticulation of the Warden's conversation.

One of the titles leaped out at her. She slid it gently from the shelf.

"The Lonely Mabari?" Rebeka's fingers tightened convulsively around the book. Alistair was peering over her shoulder, shaking with laughter. His face was turning an ugly, blotchy red, presumably from holding in his buffoonish guffaws. "'A Compendium of Children's Stories'?"

Rebeka was entirely unable to keep the venom out of the look she shot him. _Demons or no demons, I detest that man_, she thought vehemently. She shoved the book into a pocket in her bag and stalked towards Elissa, who was now occupied with a tearful young girl.

She was still a better conversationalist than Alistair. Barely.

"We'll find your brother, Kaitlyn."

Rebeka sighed. This was the sort of sidetracking that was keeping them from the darkspawn. Elissa patted the distraught girl on the arm and finally moved out of the Chantry, collecting the witch, the giant, and the dog along the way. The sound of arrows thudding into straw targets filled the air, as though the screaming gulls and creaking boats didn't serve well enough to make a din. Elissa was forced to raise her voice to be heard over the frantic uproar.

"It turns out we have some errands to run," Elissa said. "I'm going to make some calls around the town."

"Shall we accompany you?" Leliana asked, her head tilting inquisitively like some sort of songbird.

Elissa shrugged. "That's not necessary. It might be better for us to split up, until nightfall. We need to get this place in shape to fight off those ghouls, that's all I care about right now." She paused a moment. Her green eyes swept over the group like she was looking for something. Elissa shook her head and turned away, trudging around the militia that were frantically training in the front of the chantry. Alistair followed after her like a puppy, the mabari trotting by his side.

"The less time I spend among these louts, the better," Morrigan grumbled. It only took moments for the witch to disappear into the shadows. Her departure seemed to signal the general dissolution of the little knot their group made. Leliana was the last to flit away, chirping something about the Chantry as she went.

It took minutes for Rebeka to realize where she'd wandered to, the feeling of her shoes knocking on a wooden walkway bringing her back to herself. Her head was pounding like nothing she'd ever experienced before. Her eyes felt like they were swimming in her sockets. She came to a narrow gap between the buildings that extended over the water. The view was stunning—Rebeka had never seen the white-capped swells that had always lapped at the base of the Circle Tower. This was nearly the first time she'd seen the source of a sound she'd grown up hearing. Across the little bay were sheer cliffs that rose to a point with a massive castle perched at the very tip. Even through the brackish haze that lay over everything, the scene still looked picturesque.

A groan ripped its way out of Rebeka's throat as a spike of pain shot through her head. Her knees buckled without her consent. Her vision was swimming with blues and purples. All she could do was curl up against the side of one of the buildings and gasp. Her eyes chanced upon the castle again and she caught her breath.

There was some sort of storm centered on the fortress, a roiling black and purple cloud. She could see the shreds in the world where the Fade was poking through, perfectly layered on the physical world and yet not quite _right_. At the center of it all was a bright light. It was white hot on her eyes. The pounding in her head intensified the longer she stared at it. Her stomach was coiled so tightly in knots she thought she might vomit.

A pair of purple smudges appeared in the corner of her vision for a moment and then vanished. A moment later Rebeka gasped as a shock of cold water slammed into her face. The headache faded away as she spluttered on the dock.

"Damn magic," she hissed as she hauled herself to her feet. Her head felt tender, like her mind had been split right open. The glassy ringing from her Fade dreams pounded against her ears. She stumbled against the side of a building. She could feel the Veil giving little pops, like the edge of a bubble, replacing the ringing with voices and noises and colors and pictures. Fear washed over her, even though she wasn't afraid. She slipped to the ground once again.

"Rebeka?"

The mage squinted up at the source of the voice. Lots of armor…golden halo… An armored hand grabbed her arm and hauled her to her feet.

"Nice sword," she mumbled. _Pop, pop, pop_ went the Veil. "Is that new?"

"Are you drunk?"

"No…" Though the slur in her voice didn't help her case. "Tell everyone to shut up, please." Images of skeletons running towards her filled her vision for a moment, and then the image of a pretty girl sauntered up to her and caressed her face. She laughed as the Veil popped and her gauntleted arm slapped a Rebeka.

"She's insane," she heard Alistair murmur to someone else. Rebeka frowned. Maybe he was right—she wasn't supposed to act like this. The waves of pain washing through her head and the torrent of sounds and images needed to go. Sparks danced across her skin as she crushed _down_ on all of the invaders in her mind. There was one last ripple through the Fade and then finally everything settled back into place. Rebeka sighed.

Alistair and Elissa were staring. Rebeka was still limp in Alistair's grip. Her blue eyes found his hazel ones and she nearly pouted. "You wanted to hit me," she accused. The templar rolled his eyes.

Elissa had one eyebrow cocked, her hand on the hilt of her sword. She grabbed the mage's arm as Alistair walked on.

"We're going to have a chat about this later."

Rebeka nodded. The truth would out sooner or later. At this point, though, she honestly didn't know if she knew any more than Elissa at this point.

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><p><strong>Please review!<strong>


	10. Chapter 10

~O~

Chapter Ten: Proelio in Rupe

"Hold steady, men!" Elissa's voice filled the ravine the defenders had chosen for their battlefield, echoing a few times before fading away. The unearthly growls it had covered rose again to fill their ears. Unclean green fog spread down the path, and the sound of rattling bone and armor advanced with it. The warriors on the path gripped their weapons with white knuckled fingers.

Rebeka had no idea where they had picked up the knights and the dwarf and the mercenaries, but she was suddenly glad when she made out the first skeletons shambling down the path. They were in varying states of decay, with strips of skin sloughing off as they moved down the path, and their eyes glowed red. The mage could feel her head begin to pulse with pain again as she felt some demonic influence prying at her mind. The same influence shrouded each of the moving skeletons.

Warden Elissa looked agitated, shifting her balance back and forth and twirling her sword. The skeletons advanced rapidly. Rebeka's eyes flicked toward her leader. When was she planning on calling for an attack?

Almost as if she had read her mind, the Warden's eyes narrowed and she thrust her sword forward. "Attack!" came the cry, and suddenly everyone sprang into action.

Battle was too confusing with so many people around. It made Rebeka want to scream—how in the Void was she supposed to cast spells when every useful spell put one of her allies in danger? She finally decided to just pull an arcane shield into being and run forward, throwing lightning from her hands. The pain in her head grew worse with every step she took towards the skeletons, but now she was free to _fight_. It was exhilarating to say the least, and she didn't hesitate to switch from lightning to fire when she saw how easily the skeleton's dry scraps of skin caught. Their howls were certainly frightening, but there was nothing quite like watching their red eyes fade to black after just a little too much exposure to the flames.

"They're coming from the water! Oh, Maker, they're coming from the water!"

Elissa instantly disengaged from the battle, but that was fine. Rebeka launched a boulder at the skeleton the Warden had been slashing at and grinned when the undead monster exploded into tiny fragments.

"Knights, Dwyn, guard the pass! Everyone else, follow!" Elissa bellowed, and barreled down the hill after the terrified militiaman. Rebeka glanced at the now empty pass and shrugged. Might as well.

It was eerie to watch the skeletons shamble from the water. These ones were equipped with piecemeal armor and various weapons that could have belonged to guardsmen up at the castle. Their red eyes pierced the gloom just like those others though, and Rebeka was just as eager to kill these as she'd been to kill the ones up the hill. They weren't exactly darkspawn, but they were the next best thing and Rebeka was more than ready.

The warriors rushed straight for the shoreline and left the militia huddled in their circle of fire in front of the Chantry. Leliana darted forward to take up a position behind one of the rough wooden barricades. "Rebeka, take cover!" the sister shouted.

Rebeka rolled her eyes and rushed after the warriors. Honestly, it wasn't Leliana's job to give her orders. As far as Rebeka was concerned, it wasn't _anyone's _job to give her orders.

Preoccupied by the thrill of battle, Rebeka didn't hear the faint cries of "Look out" coming from behind her. The club struck her head with blinding force and Rebeka could almost hear Leliana's "I told you so" as she crumpled to the ground.

~O~

Rebeka was unsurprised to find herself somewhere in the Fade, though the décor was confusing. There was a big four poster bed in the middle of a lake, but it didn't sink into the water and neither did she. All around she could feel rage demons, but they wouldn't venture into the water for some reason.

"How did I do?" a cheerful voice asked hopefully. Rebeka whirled around only to meet the eyes of a familiar desire demon. The mage gazed confusedly at the lake and the bed and shrugged.

"Um, fine, I suppose. You did this?" Rebeka went to sit on the bed only to plummet right through as though it were air. "Actually, scratch that. It needs some work."

The desire demon huffed and sank to the ground—water?— next to Rebeka. "I really thought I had it," she whined.

Rebeka shook herself. She really didn't have time for this. "Listen, I need to wake up. I could be dead soon if I don't."

The desire demon pouted. "I'm protecting you," she retorted. The demon patted the rippling lake. Rebeka's eyebrow lifted as a hunger demon swept up and easily started across the water.

"I'm not so sure." Rebeka rose to her feet and gathered her power, only to have a vertigo inducing vision shift and bolt of pain pierce her head. Suddenly she could see purple tethers stretching from each of the demons that disappeared into the distance. That same headache that assailed her whenever she was near one of the shambling skeletons in the waking world was pounding at her now. As the invisible barrier broke and the demons rushed forward, as she felt her desire demoness friend slip away, Rebeka reached forward and, with a mighty slash, severed every tether tying the lesser demons to that unknown power within the Fade.

Rebeka rocketed back into consciousness to the sound of the frustration of scores of screaming, angry demons.

~O~

"What the—?"

"How in the Void?"

"They're all dead!"

Rebeka's eyes shot open. Skeletons clad in piecemeal armor were scattered all over the ground around her in a ragged ring, one skeleton slightly ahead of the others, as if he had waded through an invisible barrier before the others. Militiamen were creeping forward with torches, still fearful, although it was clear to Rebeka that the battle was over.

Her head was still muddled from the disorienting stabs of pain and shifts in vision she kept experiencing, so when she stood it took the space of one step before she was stumbling again. Strong hands covered in chainmail were there to catch her. "Careful," Alistair cautioned. Rebeka jerked away from the templar.

"I don't need your help."

His hazel eyes were hard but he didn't press the issue. Rebeka was pleased—one less thing for her to worry about. She kicked bones out of her way as she picked her way across the battlefield. So many of these untrained militia had died… a stab of pain went through her at the sight of a disembodied head. That was simply too familiar. Why hadn't she been able to cut the demons' connections to the bodies sooner?

A hand covered in a different gauntlet gripped her shoulder gently. Rebeka lifted hooded eyes to Elissa's face. The Warden was splattered with blood and grime, but her eyes sparked with a quiet sort of victory. "Battle always has a cost, Rebeka." The mage looked down and away. Elissa's tone darkened. "This could have been much worse. I've been through worse. Thanks to us, the cost was not as steep as it would have been. You can be proud of that, at least."

Rebeka watched Elissa with sharp eyes as the Warden wandered away towards the water, Nemesis close behind. _Battle always has a cost_, she'd said, and Rebeka realized after a moment that for the Warden, they carried extra meaning. For the first time she found herself wondering about the closemouthed noble's past. _But there's time for that later,_ Rebeka thought wearily. At least, she hoped there would be.

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	11. Chapter 11

~O~

Chapter Eleven: Carcer

Rebeka shivered as a cold drop of water splashed against the back of her neck. She gazed uneasily up at the cracked ceiling of the cramped stone tunnel. Not far above her was the glacial water of Lake Calenhad…and the roof was leaking. Claustrophobia kept trying to sink its claws into her.

The tunnel ahead was dark. They had only brought one torch with them from the mill, and that torch was currently in Morrigan's bone-pale hand. Elissa and Alistair walked on either side of her, swords at the ready. Every once in a while, the tunnel would suddenly twist, or the Qunari would move just the right way, to block the light completely from Rebeka's view. In those moments, the panting of the mabari by her side was the only thing that she could sense. That, and the constantly dripping ceiling. And the faint ringing sound that came, unfaltering, from the minds around her…

A pattering of quick steps sounded from ahead of them and Elissa and Alistair raised their swords. Red hair flashed in the torchlight. "Peace, friends, it is only me," Leliana whispered. "Be careful. There are some…creatures, up ahead." She seemed to melt away into the shadows.

Elissa shot a glance at Alistair and nodded grimly. Morrigan fell back without a word, letting the warriors lead the way into a small, dank corridor. Torchlight flickered from the walls and Rebeka sighed with relief. No more of that cramped darkness. Gurgling howls and clanking met her ears before she was able to get a good look—but even one glance turned out to be more than she needed. Elissa and Alistair had already dismembered the pair of walking skeletons by the time Rebeka realized what was happening.

"P-p-please, help me," a weak voice rasped from inside the cell.

Rebeka would know that thin, mousy voice anywhere.

"_Jowan?_" His name ripped from her mouth before she could think, and she was rushing forwards without a single thought to the bemused looks Alistair and Elissa were shooting her. Her first instinct as her hands wrapped around the cold iron bars was to reach through and hug her friend, but her joy turned to anger and frustration as the memory of the night she'd fled the tower surfaced. Suddenly, she found herself wishing that her hands were wrapped around his neck instead of the chilly iron.

"Rebeka?" His voice was as meek and nervous as ever, which Rebeka found absurdly surprising. Somehow she had expected him to be more fearsome, or more sinister, or something. He was almost disappointingly unchanged. Scraggly, bruised, paper thin…there was no one less cut out for being a blood mage than Jowan, to look at him. And yet, here they were.

"What in the Void are you doing here? Escaped the Tower to land in some Arl's dungeon? Was your little blood magic stunt only a one-time deal?" She heard soft gasps behind her, but her attention and roiling fury was focused entirely upon Jowan's terrified doe eyes. His face had gone completely white at the sight of her and now his mouth was opening and closing stupidly, like a fish slowly dying in a Redcliffe fisherman's net.

Alistair broke the brief silence with a curse. "Blood mage? You can't be serious." Rebeka shot a scornful glance back at him. His face was turning a blotchy red in the torchlight. "The penalty for blood magic is _death_," he said, turning to Elissa. Leliana was nodding along.

"Oh shut _up_, templar," Rebeka hissed. That got a chuckle from Morrigan, and another chuckle, deeper and darker and infinitely more sinister, from the empty air. That chuckle sent a lightning bolt of fear lancing through the storm of anger, confusion, and homesickness that had been roiling inside Rebeka. _No emotion_, she commanded herself, slamming a lid on her uncontrolled feelings. She wrenched away from the bars and stalked a few steps towards the darkness. She needed to get a grip.

She could feel their eyes on her, but she could also feel _his_ eyes, when by rights he should have no hold over her during her waking hours. _This isn't how this works,_ she wanted to wail. She should have been safe here!

"Beka? Please, help…I swear, I'm not a blood mage, I've given it up! Don't let them hurt me, please, Beka, please…" Rebeka shook her head and clutched her arms to herself. He had been her only friend for years, and his voice pulled at her heart dangerously. She _would not_ look back.

Chainmail clinked. Elissa's voice rose softly, "We need to know what's happened in the castle, Jowan. Until then, we can't decide anything. Was this your doing?"

Had he started to sob, or was his voice breaking from fear? Rebeka tried to ignore it, tried to focus on mastering herself so that her demon would not rush in to fill the cracks. The Veil was too weak here. Even as she tried to fight Pride, she could feel another touch on her mind, the same one that had split her head with headaches the day before. It was all too much.

Slowly, Elissa pried the story from Jowan, and it brought Rebeka relief she shouldn't have felt. Jowan was a man uniquely gifted with failure, beginning at the Circle and continuing ever since. After escaping the Tower, he had failed to escape manipulation at the hands of the agents of Teryn Loghain, then failed to teach the Arl's young son how to control his magic, and finally failed to convince Arlessa Isolde that he was innocent of the horrors that had befallen the castle. Ironically, yet all to the good for the wayward mage, he had also failed to be killed when braver men had perished at the hands of Connor's walking dead, leaving him here, shivering and fearful, in his cell in Eamon's dungeons.

Rebeka had heard Elissa's voice growing increasingly hard as she questioned the wayward mage and knew that an ultimatum was coming. Moments later, Elissa stepped back and said, "You are as responsible for this catastrophe as Connor or the Arlessa, Jowan, so I'm offering you a choice. You can come with us right now, fight with us, and set the situation to rights. Once we are done fighting and the castle is safe, you will face Arl Eamon's judgment and accept it, whatever it might be. Or, you can choose to stay, and I will have Sten strike off the lock and Alistair will deliver the sentence you deserve right now, as an admitted blood mage."

Rebeka was forced to turn and meet Jowan's eyes at that. _Come with us, you bumbling idiot_, she beseeched him with wide blue eyes. She could feel Pride and the other demon crowding close, feeding on the thin trickle of fear she felt for her friend. His eyes were darting back and forth in terror. _Come on!_

"I-I-I'll come with you, of course I will," he finally stammered. Rebeka didn't wait for Sten to unsheathe his greatsword, she simply magicked a stone from the side of the tunnel to smash the lock and yanked the door open. "I swear to you, I just want to make everything right," he was gushing at anyone who cared to listen as he stepped out of the cell. That turned out to be no one, as Elissa and Alistair led the group up the stairs at a run.

Rebeka eyed Jowan grimly. "You had better do something amazing, Jowan, because once we rescue the Arl I can guarantee he won't be happy." She didn't wait for him to respond as she fell into step behind Morrigan.

The following two hours were a bloody mess as they cleared the castle room by room. The walking skeletons never seemed to end, and each one held a demon that pounded against Rebeka's consciousness. Pride's touch seemed to recede as Rebeka fell into the clear-headed rhythm she only felt when fighting, but the other demon was never far. More than once, she heard the other members of Elissa's group curse as a shambling skeleton dressed in a child's clothes or the roughspun dress of a young woman came running at them, screaming. They all sustained wounds from the dirty, close quarters fighting. Alistair's forearm dripped blood through his mail where a possessed mabari had bitten him, and Elissa's cheek bled from three gashes where a skeleton had clawed her. Morrigan's side was decorated with myriad tiny cuts where a shade had burst through a door so forcefully that the wood had seemed to explode into flying splinters. Rebeka herself was caught in the collarbone by a skeleton that leaped from behind her with a cleaver. It had meant to slice her throat with the knife, but the mage had twisted in time to deflect the cut and thrust a lightning bolt into the dead cook that fried the demon from the body.

By the time they all emerged from the last cellar, bruised and bloody, the light had begun to fade towards sunset. The main courtyard was empty of skeletons… or so it seemed for a moment, until a corpse dressed in heavy plate, with eyes that glowed a demonic red, stepped from behind a wagon holding a six foot long greatsword.

"Revenant," Rebeka gasped. Elissa's eyes grew wide.

"The knights… our reinforcements…"

The portcullis was down, however, and there was no time. The revenant was already upon them. Rebeka unleashed a stream of lightning at the monster and flinched as she heard the sound of crossbows thrumming. Somehow there were more skeletons, these ones dressed as guards. A shout drew her ear, and she glanced at Elissa, who was waving towards the gate as she dodged the revenant's massive blows. Rebeka followed her gaze and a spike of relief shot through her as she saw… She grabbed Jowan, heedless of the sticky blood that flowed from a gash on his upper arm, and thrust him towards the gate, yelling, "Get it open!"

When the knights rushed through, their battle cries were the sweetest sound Rebeka had heard all day. She thrust both mind and mana into her final lightning strike and felt the demon rip from the revenant's body at the same time that she heard the dead flesh crackling from the heat. She dropped to one knee as a wave of exhaustion hit her.

A mailed glove slid into her vision. Rebeka grasped the hand and allowed it to pull her back to her feet. She met Alistair's guarded hazel eyes for an instant as he said, "We've still got work to do." In that, they were in agreement. Elissa was already gathering the knights together with her own band of fighters. "We can't know for sure what is happening in that hall, Ser Perth," she was saying slowly, pain thrumming in her voice. Her helm dangled from one hand, dented beyond usefulness by a blow from the revenant's sword. Rebeka directed a stream of rejuvenating energy at the Warden, stopping only when the dazed look faded from her eyes. She finally nodded and turned to the assembled fighters.

"We must be prepared for anything when we enter the hall," Elissa said, running a hand through her sweat-matted red hair. "Two of you knights are staying to guard the entrance to the hall while the rest of us go inside. It could be that Bann Teagan has managed to buy us a parley, so no one attacks until I signal. Is that clear?"

Elissa did not wait for an answer. She was halfway up the steps before the knights could even assemble, though their own group was alert and on edge from the grueling dungeon fighting and stayed right on her heels. Alistair wore an especially grim and worried expression, but the others could have been made of stone for all the emotion they showed. Rebeka's own mask was slipping towards a grimace of pain as the pounding in her head increased. Whatever demon was controlling the castle was most certainly inside that hall, and it did not want visitors.

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	12. Chapter 12

~O~

Chapter Twelve: Tam Prope

Head pain and confusion hit Rebeka at the same time as soon as she ducked around Sten's armored back and saw what was happening in the main hall of Redcliffe Castle. The well-dressed, perfectly mannered Bann Teagan was doing…somersaults? Somehow, in this ancient hall with its massive, blazing firepit and rows of gleaming suits of armor, its ornate runner and priceless tapestries, the foolish antics seemed particularly obscene. The child that was laughing and clapping made daggers claw through her head every time she glanced at him. After a few moments, her vision seemed to shift and she once again saw the roiling purple storm, only now realizing that it was centered directly on the boy.

She couldn't help the little "Ah" that escaped her lips as understanding came to her. _So this is Connor, _she thought. And it seemed the demon nestling inside his brain had no manners at all. The Bann finished his ridiculous little routine and hopped—like a frog!—onto the dais at the center of the room. Rebeka nearly gaped as she saw the snotty little child-demon pat his uncle on the head, like a dog.

Elissa had an almost queasy look on her face. Rebeka glanced her way, wondering if the Warden was going to say something, but speech seemed to have fled from the red-head. It was only when a loud sniffle broke through the inane mutterings of the Bann that Rebeka finally noticed the Lady Isolde standing in the shadows at the corner of the dais. The sniffle seemed to bring Elissa back to herself, because she finally strode forward with a determined frown on her face.

The child-demon's eyes lit up. "Oh, more pawns for me to play with?" He was most certainly a demon—if the unnaturally bright eyes and maniacal behavior hadn't given it away, the layered deep and child-like voices undoubtedly would have. "Funny, when you ran off to the village to betray me, I thought it was knights you were looking for, _Mother_." The sneer in Connor's voice when he addressed Isolde made Alistair's expression curdle. The demon seemed to find it amusing to pretend that the real Connor still had control.

Elissa gestured off-handedly at Ser Perth and his knights. "Never fear, Connor, we brought those too."

The demon laughed. The sound sent a shiver up Rebeka's spine. "Oh, she's funnier than you ever were, Uncle," the creature cackled, and Teagan flinched and muttered something in a strangled parody of his usual voice.

"This is getting creepier by the second," Alistair muttered.

Elissa continued on, though Rebeka didn't think there was any reasoning with the insane demon-child hybrid. "Connor, what is your aim here? To save your father, or to kill him? Do you no longer care if he lives or dies?"

"Father is in no danger," the demon scoffed, his hand fluttering towards what Rebeka assumed was Eamon's general direction. "He's safe and sound, fast asleep and completely alive, just as I wanted him. And even better, with him out of the way, I can rule however I want! My soldiers are free to follow my every desire, and soon my minions will spread to the southern hills and beyond!"

Elissa's hand drifted up to clench on the hilt of the longsword strapped to her waist. "Is he fast asleep, or as good as dead?" Her voice was cold.

"He is _alive_, fool! It was a fair deal, and I've kept my end!" the demon yelled, spittle flying from his mouth. Elissa bared an inch of steel. That was when Isolde finally lurched out of the shadows, terror on her face.

"Please, don't hurt my son! He's not responsible for what he does," she begged. Rebeka found herself caught up in studying the patchwork of lumps and bruises that adorned the lady's fair skin.

"He hardly seems shy about hurting you," Morrigan quipped, her voice dry. Isolde's panicked sobs rang through the hall as she tried to put her own body between the warriors and her demon-child.

The room seemed to lurch underneath Rebeka as the purple haze vanished, blessedly taking the daggers stabbing at her brain along with it. "Mother?" The voice was scared, young, and demon-free. "What's…what's happening?" But no sooner had the Arlessa turned to comfort her son than the haze was back and the daggers firmly in place. The demon shoved the Arlessa so forcefully that she fell to the ground.

"Get off of me, fool woman! I told you never to touch me!" The demon rounded on the warriors standing bemused in the hall with wild eyes. "My patience is at an end, especially with that one—" he gestured angrily at Elissa. "Everyone knows it's rude to interrupt a person's games, and I _know_ you're responsible for demolishing my army in the village!" For a moment, the demon actually sounded like a petulant little boy. Then, his demeanor stilled and he smiled a creepy little smile. "But then, let's keep things civil. Tell me why you're here, and I may just let you live."

Elissa raised an eyebrow and said, "Why, we're here to stop you, of course."

The demon child smiled. "I was hoping you'd say that."

The suits of armor lining the room came to life suddenly, and Rebeka gasped as she finally heard the ringing of their minds. She hadn't been able to tell before, with so many people in the room and so much pain in her head. "Careful," she shouted. "These ones are alive!" The moment that the sound of steel crashing together rang in the room, the purple storm seemed to shudder and vanish once again, and Rebeka caught sight of the demon-boy slipping from the room before she had to dodge a mace blow from one of the guards. "Sorry" she muttered, and then slammed a rock into the back of his head and added a Sleep spell. Hopefully he'd be out for a while. She saw Elissa parrying blows from a hypnotized Teagan and sent a crackle of lightning hissing past his nose, momentarily blinding him. Elissa saw the opening and slammed the pommel of her blade into his temple. The nobleman dropped like a rock.

The fight had been short, but thankfully not bloody. Teagan and the guards slowly came to, showing no further signs of the demon's mind control to the relief of every knight and warrior in the room. Rebeka herself went to lean against a wall next to Jowan, wincing as the storm and daggers flickered on and off inside her head.

"Connor's still in there, at least in part. He's fighting the demon's control right now, but whatever it is, it's strong," she muttered to him.

"If he's still in there, then there may be a chance for us to save him," Jowan whispered. Rebeka nodded.

"If you've got any ideas, you'd better clue the others in quickly. We need to deal with this Connor thing _now_." If not to save the people remaining in and around Redcliffe, then at least to stop the pounding in her head.

Isolde was clinging to Elissa and Teagan in turns, her voice growing more and more desperate.

Elissa swiped her arm impatiently, snapping, "I don't see any other way, Isolde. He's an abomination."

The Arlessa simply wailed wordlessly. Teagan gathered his sister-in-law into his arms.

"He's my nephew as well as your son, my lady," he said softly. "But wouldn't this be kinder than to let him live as a slave to the demon?"

Rebeka felt Jowan stiffen next to her and eyed him. _Whatever you're going to do, make it good_, she willed him. Her eyes followed his dirty, bruised form as he strode over to the nobles.

"If I may…"

Isolde's eyes lit with fury, and Teagan suddenly went from holding her in his arms to holding her back as she lunged for him. "_You!_ This is all your fault, Jowan!"

His courage wavered but held. "My lady, I summoned no demon, I swear! But… but I did poison the Arl, and that started all of this. All I want now is to make things right!"

"Listen to him, Lady Isolde." The eyes in the room all fixed suddenly on Rebeka, who met their stares with hooded blue eyes. Slowly the attention turned back to Jowan, who cleared his throat.

"I know a way to save Connor… but you may not like it. You see, the easiest way to remove a demon from this side of the Veil is to kill the host—"

"No!" the Arlessa snarled. Elissa's mouth was set in a grim line.

Jowan continued, "But the other way is to send a mage into the Fade and kill the demon there. Normally it takes mages, and a lot of lyrium. But I can do it with my… blood magic."

Alistair shouldered forward, hand on his sword. "Not an option. Blood magic is forbidden."

Isolde ignored the interruption. Her expression had changed from feral anger to something resembling childlike desperation. "So you are saying you could save my boy? My sweet Connor might live?"

Jowan sighed and let the worst of it fly. "Yes, but for the spell to work, I'd need a lot of blood. All of it, actually."

Rebeka would have heard a pin drop in the silence that followed. Then, the stabbing pain in her head returned with a vengeance and the sounds of unearthly howls echoed throughout the castle. Time was running out.

"Or, I could do it," she called out, one hand massaging her temple. She fought a pained grimace. "It's a long story, but I can go into the Fade without the bloodshed. Let me fight the demon there. It's been attacking me all day, the least I can do is pay it back with its own coin."

Elissa was glaring daggers at her. Rebeka sighed. The noble was a woman who hated surprises, especially ones from within her own command—that much was clear. But better she do this and save a child's life than keep her powers a secret any longer and cause numerous deaths.

Isolde was crying again. "Please, if you can, you must do it! For my sweet baby, please!"

"Ser Perth," Elissa barked. The knight snapped to attention. "Take your knights and clear the castle of whatever's making that racket out there. Morrigan, you take Sten and Nemesis and scour the rest of the grounds for more undead. Alistair, Jowan, you're with me." She pointed at Isolde. "Where would Connor have run off to?"

"Why, his bedroom most likely… why? What are you going to do?" The relief on her face melted back into fear.

Elissa offered no answer, except to fix Teagan with an iron hard stare. "Keep her here," she ordered. She began the march out of the hall, pausing only to grip Rebeka's arm hard enough to bruise. "We're going to make doubly sure that nothing goes wrong. _Don't_ fail us."

Rebeka met the noble's emerald stare and grinned a small, feral grin. "Oh, I won't," she promised.

~O~

She was damn glad that she had figured out how to pop into the Fade while awake. Otherwise, things might have gotten awkward. "What possessed me to offer to do this?" Rebeka wondered aloud.

Prickles of pain danced around her form and she sighed. "Oh yeah, that's why." This demon needed to die, and quickly. Rebeka wondered about demon death as she stared around the Fade. Would the demon disappear forever, or just rematerialize later? _Doesn't matter right now, I guess_, she thought. She could hear the ringing of minds around her, and she noticed that the grassy walkways and lava filled courtyards surrounding her were vaguely reminiscent of Redcliffe Castle. She peered over the edge of a bridge made of bone and saw stone cairns that could have been rough representations of Redcliffe Village. Clearly, the demon didn't have good enough vision through Connor's eyes to make a better replica. Hopefully her lack of control over Connor meant she'd have an equal lack of control over the Fade.

The strongest sensation by far was the diseased sounding ringing coming from above her and to the right. That, and the prickles that were running up and down her whole body. They weren't particularly painful anymore, not now that she was in her element, but they were annoying and gave her the creeps. Rebeka was sure to control _that_ sensation as fear-wisps began to materialize around her.

The mage jumped as a shadowy figure sprinted by. She could hear the muffled sounds of plate armor, and watched as a squad of other armored shadows trooped by. Elsewhere, other shadowy, translucent figures moved about the castle. It was eerie, and new. Rebeka didn't like new things in the Fade.

"Time to move," she told herself. She cursed and froze again as a frightened call rang out.

"Father! Father, where are you?" That was definitely Connor. But Connor should be shackled to the demon right now… right? He ran into view, nearly as solid as Rebeka herself.

"W-who are you? Have you seen Father?" the boy asked, voice echoing.

Rebeka's eyes widened and then narrowed, a smile playing across her face. "Nice try, demon." She needed only to twist her magical vision to see the ghostly tether tying the illusion to the demon. She didn't waste her time walking; it was much faster simply to swirl the Fade around herself like a cloak and travel through the very fabric of the dream-scape to the demon at the end of the tether.

The demon was waiting for her, she saw. Or rather, the demoness was waiting. Rebeka should have known it was going to be a desire demon. Only desire and pride had the kind of intelligence and energy needed to wreak the kind of havoc that Redcliffe had just been put through.

Unlike Rebeka's sometime-friend, this desire demoness looked at her without interest or curiosity. Those cloudy black eyes only held naked greed. Her body—just a little too inhuman for comfort—was purple and clothed in ruffles and jewels.

"So, you've come to play? Finally," the demoness purred.

Rebeka snorted. "Ah, so all of that brain-stabbing you were doing was simply a friendly invitation? Sorry I didn't get the message."

The demoness pouted and leaned sinuously against an obsidian pillar. Rebeka warily studied the rest of their surroundings as the demon said, "No need for the sarcasm, darling. We can be civil here, can't we?"

Rebeka was glad she could shape the Fade to her will. They were boxed into a tiny circular valley with only one narrow exit. Aside from the pillar, there were only jagged rocks thrusting from the base of the cliffs and soggy moss that sucked at her feet with each step.

"I don't see much of a chance for civility, to be honest. Not with you possessing the little mage, and all. Besides, you killed a hefty number of villagers with your… antics. Speaking of which, where is Connor?" There was some ringing here, some sort of frightened mind, but the demoness was doing something to hide it and judging from her expression, her lips were sealed on that count.

The demoness raised her pencil-thin eyebrows and sashayed forward. Those black eyes tried to look innocent, but still only seemed hungry, needy. Rebeka could almost feel another set of purple-black eyes prickling at the back of her neck but couldn't afford to turn. "I can't help my nature, Rebeka," she said, sending chills down the mage's spine. "His need was so pure, so frantic. How can I resist when the child calls to every fiber of my _being_? And besides, the trade was so simple, so sweet."

Rebeka backed away a step as the demon advanced, purple fire swirling around her horns and ripples of need and desire floating through the Fade around her. "Is that who you are? Some kind of… Desperate Need?"

The demon purred. "That's exactly right, darling. And I know you have desperate need as well. Let me help…" The black eyes flicked on something over Rebeka's shoulder and the mage turned despite herself. Anger and fear coiled through her at once as she saw the rusty, bloody eyes of Pride, saw his yellow grin. Rebeka slammed the walls of the canyon closed. Dust and rubble flew through the air on the heels of a magnificent _boom_.

"Get away, demon! It's time to end this, right _now_!" Rebeka gathered white fire in her hands and expelled it in a stream. The sound it made was horrific, as though the very air was ripping apart. The demon shrieked in anger and leaped, splitting into seven copies as she did. Rebeka went down under the claws of the copies—all of which felt far too real for her liking. She folded herself into the Fade and spat herself back out behind the pillar. The demon cried out once more, enraged, and whirled just in time to find the pillar flying at all seven of her. There was no time to dodge, and she found the walls of the canyon more solid than they should have been as the pillar slammed all of her into paste.

Rebeka recoiled in horror as the purple goo began to coalesce back into an inhuman form. Uncanny as the demoness had appeared before, this misshapen monster was worse. Her eyes were both on one side of a face that looked half melted, and she no longer bothered with breasts or ruffles. She flew forward, boosted by lightning, and Rebeka suddenly found her feet mired in Fade. Instead of wasting time trying to escape, she instead imagined her skin as steel and met the impact with a crash. Her metallic body didn't save her from the pain of the lightning as it coursed through her, and the steel melted back into flesh as her form convulsed with pain.

Gasping, tears streaming down her face, Rebeka lashed out with her elemental powers, drawing the spikes from the wall at blinding speed. They converged on the center of the canyon just as Rebeka shot herself upward, and she grinned as the demon found her body impaled in every direction with jagged stone spikes. She melted the canyon into a bowl of lava and kept herself suspended, tugging on the Fade to make sure she was secure. As the demoness shrieked in agony and clawed her way upwards, Rebeka compressed a nearby Fade structure into diamond-hard pebbles and shot them into the bowl. The furious screams told her that at least a few were hitting the mark.

Joy turned to pain as a coil of lava wrapped itself around her ankle and yanked her down into the pit. It was all she could do to transform the lava into snow and stagger back to her feet. She drew restoring energy from the Fade into herself. The demoness came at her now, her flesh a mass of oozing red more than purple, and Rebeka leaped forward, a dagger of ice clutched into her hand. Aided by her restoring magic and braced by the cold, her movement was lightning fast. She flinched as her ice dagger sunk to its hilt in demon-flesh.

Then, something changed. The prickling feeling started to fade. The demon's eyes went from hungry to fearful. Elation went soaring through her heart. The thrill of victory shot through her body. _Pride_ clouded her mind.

That was all it took. One moment, Desperate Need was in desperate need of healing magic, and the next, her eyes blazed white with power and she wrenched herself free of the icy dagger that pierced her flesh. She cackled and ripped a hole in the Fade, disappearing down into a dark abyss that smelled of ash and blood and wet dog.

Then, red eyes and yellow teeth and a rusted iron crown filled her vision and she was scrambling to get away as Pride's withered hands encircled her neck. The air grew hazy with her fear and Pride's joy. Her skin turned gray as she heaved all of her power at him in dizzying waves.

Her last jolt of power was a lightning bolt, pushed up from her hands into Pride's rib cage, that lit the Fade up purple. In the millisecond that his hands were knocked free, Rebeka made her escape, opening a rift in the Fade that wrenched her back to consciousness.

Teagan and Isolde were gone from the Great Hall, but that didn't stop Rebeka flinching away from the Arlessa's tortured, endless wail coming from the second story of Redcliffe Castle.

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><p><strong>Thanks for reading so far, it means a lot to me! And also... please review! <span><br>**


	13. Chapter 13-Interlude

~O~

Interlude

Her footsteps sounded oddly muffled as she made her way up the stairs. Everything was cloudy, her mind sluggish as if filled with cotton. Unrelenting dread seemed to pull harder at her insides with each step she took upwards.

She lifted a hand to point out a spot to Alistair. "Guard the door. There could be other creatures about," she said, hearing her voice as though from far away. That door… she _did not_ want to go through that door. Every fiber of her being did not want to go through that door. There was a voice in her ear that seemed to be whispering _duty_ and _responsibility_, so she steeled herself and pushed through that dread portal, the blood mage floating in her wake.

Everything she saw was familiar. The bed, the bookcases, the toys, the small child. He was huddled in a corner, eyes wide and frightened. His hair was red-blonde one moment, brown the next, and she frowned at the flickering of the colors. Shadows seemed to crowd the room.

"Don't worry…" she said, the words springing to her lips unbidden. He looked up, and now it was clear that something was not right. Black lines crawled over his skin and his eyes shone with ghoulish light. She couldn't stop her mouth, saying, "I'm not here to hurt you" even as she drew her longsword with a metallic scrape. The pale, ghoul eyes were so wide, so innocent, so helpless. One of the shadows prowled closer. The dread contracted in Elissa's heart—she knew what came next—and was powerless to stop herself as the longsword darted forward and the Tainted child impaled itself on the silvery metal.

There was a scream…

And suddenly Elissa was awake, shoving her tangled red hair away from her eyes and trying not to gasp. She could see Alistair eyeing her resentfully from across the fire and lowered her head into her hands.

That dream… had been wrong on so many counts. There had been no wide eyes pleading for aid, no prowling shadows with half-familiar faces, and most of all no ghouls leaping onto her blade. And still it had felt so real, and she so helpless within its grasp. Elissa couldn't stand it anymore. She grabbed her sword, the familiar steel of the Cousland family blade comforting in her grip, and stalked to the edge of camp. The chilly night air was bracing against her face. The breeze off of Lake Calenhad was quite brisk at this time of year.

She wandered forward until the tips of her boots hung over a drop into the glacial waters of the lake. _No_, she thought, _no ghouls_. Instead, she and Jowan had entered the room to find the boy huddled, as her dreaming mind had remembered, in the corner. He was twitching and shuddering, and her steel had been at the ready in her palm. Then he'd gone still, and then his eyes opened to reveal pitch blackness, and before Elissa could even react, the abomination exploded its magic in every direction, incinerating the majority of the room's contents.

And Jowan, the blood mage, had redeemed himself. Where Elissa was frozen, the mage had been lightning. Without the magical shield, Elissa would be dead. She would never doubt that. But the cost…

Elissa had been quick after that. She had slashed the demon open from neck to hip, and then stabbed through his heart for good measure. It was not a clean death. And then a moment later she turned and saw Jowan on the floor, and realized that in saving her, he had given his own life.

The Warden stooped and grabbed a rock the size of her head and hurled it into the lake. It dropped with a satisfying _thunk_. She picked up another rock.

In her dream, the child had flickered between the Connor she remembered and another little boy, familiar, brown haired. Elissa laughed once, choked, remembering that the little hairball couldn't even pronounce the word _sword_. Oren's death hadn't been clean either.

The second rock splashed weakly as she threw it at the whitecaps. She gritted her teeth.

Connor's body hadn't changed the way she thought it would when the demon finally took over. He'd still looked so human, so harmless and child-like. And with Isolde screaming and sobbing, it was easy to believe that there could have been another way.

"There wasn't," she muttered, but it sounded weak. Some monster in human skin and Amaranthine colors had slaughtered Oren and Oriana in their rooms at Castle Cousland. She liked to think she'd killed him when she fought her way out of the castle. But truly, was Elissa any better? Slaughtering Isolde's little boy in his room at Castle Redcliffe? Was she, in fact, worse—wearing the cloak of a hero, pretending to sainthood as she slaughtered the innocent? Did she deserve the same fate as the man who killed her nephew?

A third rock hit the waves with barely a sound, sinking into the black, churning waters and disappearing forever.

There was a red storm inside of her. Hatred, that bubbled and churned. She hated Rendon Howe for his treachery. She hated the darkspawn for their black corruption. She hated Duncan for saving her, and her parents for being stubborn and heroic. But right now, the person she hated most was herself.

A memory roiled to the surface, unwanted. She and Duncan were striding quickly away from the meeting before the Battle of Ostagar, and she was vehemently protesting the orders that had a short while later saved her life. The Warden Commander stopped abruptly and turned to her, gripping her arm too tightly with his calloused fingers.

"Elissa," he'd said, his dark eyes boring into hers. "You are a Grey Warden, and make no mistake—we are not heroes. We do not do what is _right_, we do what is _necessary_. Never forget that."

Elissa rocked forward onto the balls of her feet, a nervous thrill running through her as her armored body teetered on the edge of the outcrop above the lake. Faces of those she'd lost flashed before her eyes: Mother, Father, Fergus, Oren, Oriana, Rory, Duncan…

She was alone now. There was nothing left except the Taint that she could feel, even now, pulling at her blood. She was a Grey Warden, and she would do what was necessary to end the Blight. Connor's pale, cold face rose in her mind and she set her mouth grimly.

She would do _whatever_ was necessary.

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><p><strong>Please review!<strong>


	14. Chapter 14

~O~

Chapter Fourteen: Regressus

The mood in the camp had shifted subtly since they left Redcliffe. The long silences were still there, they still took the same watches, they still set up their tents and cooked mystery stews over a campfire every night, but…

Rebeka thought it was in the way Alistair kept watching Elissa. He used to watch her with a sort of hopefulness in his eyes, as though she was the answer to all of his problems. Now he just watched her with resentment. He was looking at Elissa the same way that Rebeka had always looked at the templars back at the Tower. Just like the way she usually watched him, she realized uncomfortably.

They stayed long enough to attend the funeral. They sent Connor's body floating out in a boat right next to Jowan's. The two burst into flames within moments of each other as the archers' arrows found their targets. Then they just trooped silently out of the town, heading north along the coast of Lake Calenhad. That night was when the shouting happened.

"How could you? He was just a little boy! Arl Eamon was like a father to me, and you murdered his son, just like that! How can you live with yourself?" The barrage had gone on and on. Leliana had sat, cross-legged, in front of the fire, sharpening one of her long knives. The long silence that came when Alistair finished went on forever, the scraping of the whetstone against the steel measuring the time.

"I did what I had to do, Alistair. I did everything I could to prevent his death, but in the end I will _always_ do what I have to do," Elissa finally replied. Rebeka couldn't help but flinch.

"It wasn't Elissa's fault," she whispered, eyes fixed on the campfire. The rhythmic scrape of the whetstone paused for a moment before resuming. "If I had just killed that demon…" _When I had the chance_, she finished silently. She couldn't say it aloud—they could never know how close Pride had come to overwhelming her.

The massive Qunari warrior paused in the middle of grabbing his greatsword for the evening watch and fixed Rebeka with a disapproving stare. "It is useless to dwell on that which has passed, bas saarebas."

Leliana nodded and reached over to put her hand on Rebeka's. "Just learn and grow. That's all we can ever do."

Rebeka's gaze flickered back and forth between them for a moment before she silently stood and walked to the edge of camp.

The pain was unbearable sometimes. It felt like she couldn't breathe, couldn't think. There was a storm of guilt and grief in her heart that she couldn't release. Guilt, over failing to slay Connor's demon, and grief over Jowan's sacrifice. The man was a failure at everything, all his life. He'd failed at his apprentice exams, he'd failed at his attempt to run away with his true love, he'd failed at hiding from the templars and the authorities… and then the one time he succeeded at something… Rebeka's heart clenched painfully. She wanted to grieve, but that would just let Pride one step closer.

Rebeka hadn't dared to sleep for days, and now with the events at Redcliffe, she wondered if she'd ever be ready to sleep again. She was keeping herself standing with a steady stream of mana from the Fade, but she could feel the strain growing like an itch in the back of her mind. Her body was starting to feel taut. She didn't let herself feel tired, but there was pressure building and it wanted a release.

~O~

They spent their days on the road, pushing hard to try and cover as much ground as possible each day. No one said anything, but it was hard to mistake their destination. With Lake Calenhad always to their left, traveling up the Imperial Highway, there was only one place they could be going: The Circle of Magi. Rebeka was determined to conceal how much she hated that idea.

She was starting to take comfort in the routine. Every day, after spending a few long hours awake and watching the perimeter of the camp, she'd roll her unused bedroll up and tie it to the top of her pack, and then heat some porridge over the campfire. The party would eat on the road, and then stop for a break at lunch if Elissa felt they'd made good enough time. Some days it was easy—the road was often wide near the lake, and where there were clusters of villages and farmholds, the landscape was well maintained and orderly. Other days, though, Elissa led them through stands of trees or over broken, rocky terrain. Those days, it was harder.

As if the terrain weren't enough, darkspawn always managed to complicate the issue. They could tell that the horde was moving north because the skirmishes only grew more infrequent when they had been on the road for more than a week. In between the grueling pace and the almost daily fighting, everyone was beginning to grow tired.

It was a relief to everyone in the party when they finally caught sight of the Lake Calenhad Docks. Or rather, it was a relief to everyone except Rebeka.

She had to admit: in the daylight, with the lake sparkling merrily and the clouds drifting serenely across the sky, the Circle Tower looked beautiful. She'd never gotten the opportunity to view the spires and arches from the outside, her only real opportunity being her terrified night-time escape weeks before. Still, there was a sort of chill in the air around the Tower… perhaps something to do with the dark blue tinge the stone held despite the bright sunshine.

"It seems a rather fitting cage for those fools. Does it not bother you to be back here?" Morrigan asked. Rebeka's blue eyes flicked to Morrigan's amber ones.

"A bit, yeah," she shrugged. She could feel the witch's eyes boring into her as she started forward. Of course it was a lie, but what was she supposed to say? _No, Morrigan, walking towards my execution is an absolutely delightful experience! I can't wait to get there!_ Rebeka took a deep breath to calm herself.

She caught up with Elissa at the foot of the hill. The Warden was surveying the town and the broken bridge and the little docks. "We should spend the night here before we try to get to the Tower," she was telling Alistair and Sten. Leliana had already stopped to talk to one of the fishermen in the town, and Morrigan was investigating some flowers that looked poisonous. Neither of the men seemed happy with Elissa's statement—Sten because he hated any delays in their mission, and Alistair because he still hadn't forgiven Elissa for Redcliffe.

"Elissa, may I talk to you?"

The Warden nodded. "Get us some rooms at that inn, please," she said, and dropped her coin purse into Alistair's hand. The templar walked off without a word.

The mage and the warrior wandered towards the edge of the lake. The sky was slipping quickly towards sunset, throwing orange streaks across the sky and water. The lapping of the waves was soothing, though the Tower still loomed ominously.

"He blames me for what happened to Connor," Elissa said suddenly. Rebeka sat down on a rock and drew her knees to her chin.

"He shouldn't," she said.

Elissa sat down too, heaving a deep sigh. "I'm supposed to be a Grey Warden. I'm supposed to fight _darkspawn_. I don't know how to solve all of the world's problems. I shouldn't _have_ to."

Rebeka picked at a loose patch on the rock. Gravel tumbled down the side of the stone. "You did everything you could at Redcliffe. You weren't the one who failed there."

Elissa rounded on Rebeka, and those green eyes that were usually so stoic were shining with something uncomfortably close to tears. "You didn't feel it… when he lunged and… and then when he went limp around my sword… I murdered a _child_. And he looked so much like my little nephew, after…" She cut off suddenly, and turned away. Elissa's red curls were lank and greasy, Rebeka realized. And the way her shoulders slumped and her armor was starting to hang…

The Warden got up and stepped closer to the edge of the lake, so close that the waves almost touched the toes of her boots. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't put any of that on you."

Rebeka stared up at the Circle Tower. "Don't worry. I know what it's like to go through things alone. You shouldn't have to."

Elissa turned, gratitude in her eyes. She didn't need to say anything for Rebeka to understand.

"By the way, not to give you another problem to deal with," Rebeka started, trying to keep her tone blasé, "but I can't go in there. It wouldn't end well for me." She made a slashing motion across her throat.

"Oh, don't worry about that. You're not going in there alone. I'll make _sure_ they don't lay a finger on you."

It had been so long that she thought she'd forgotten how, but Rebeka managed to smile at that. She got up and started towards the inn when Elissa's voice stopped her.

"Eventually we're going to have to learn a little bit about each other, don't you think?"

Rebeka tossed a tiny smirk back towards Elissa and left the Warden to stare across the marmalade waters of Lake Calenhad.

~O~

That night, in the Fade, Rebeka frowned as she studied the ringing, pulsing lights that represented the other dreamers around her. She was in the common room of the inn, or at least, a close replica of it. There were a couple of dreamers who had passed out in the common room after a night of drinking. Their dreams were about wine and wenches, and every now and then wisps would float over to start playing with them harmlessly.

Rebeka knew she was getting better at accessing the dreams. It was all about shifting her perspective. Now that she knew what they were, it was easier to push through the haze and reach their sleeping minds.

A dissonant note crept into the air and Rebeka glanced up. She trotted up the stairs and to what would have been Elissa's door. The mage took a deep breath and then opened the door, pushing against the slight resistance as she tried to shift her perspective.

Instead of stepping into the stark wooden room in the inn, Rebeka found herself surrounded by stone and thick woolen carpets and a bed with fine linen sheets. Elissa was by the door with a short sword in hand, blood on her nightgown. Her eyes were wild and frightened. She donned armor with the speed one only has in dreams and then rushed out of her chambers, Rebeka following silently behind. The first body they found, in the hall outside Elissa's room, was that of a red haired knight. Elissa's breath hissed out as if she were in pain. There was no time for her to react as darkspawn swarmed forward. Rebeka was too surprised to react as Elissa cut them down.

The next body, this one in the courtyard of the castle, was a grey haired woman in an elegant dress, bloody fingers clutched around a bow. Elissa was crying now, covered with blood. This time, there was no swarm of darkspawn. Instead, Rebeka heard that same roar from Alistair's dreams and looked up in horror as a black dragon swooped into view, his claws clutching a tiny, bloody body. It only took a moment for Rebeka to think of who this third body might be.

"No!" she yelled, and with a ripping motion she tore the dream in half and pulled Elissa into a dark black corner in the Fade. Stars sparked to life around them and Rebeka placed her hands on either side of the Warden's face as she urged her into a dreamless slumber.

Rebeka forced herself out of the Fade and stumbled to the basin of water near her windowsill. She couldn't get rid of the cold sweat, or the shaking.

~O~

Ser Carroll was the same lyrium addled fool he'd been when Rebeka had left the Tower, and it was clear to everyone that Elissa was rapidly becoming irritated with him.

"Parsharra," Sten finally growled, pushing forward. "Will you accept _these_ as payment to let us cross?"

Carroll's eyes lit up. "Cookies?"

Alistair gave the Qunari a dumbfounded look. "Cookies?"

"I relieved them from a fat, slovenly child in the last village we passed. He did not need more," Sten said, a stern look on his face. Leliana was laughing quietly behind her hand. Even Elissa seemed to be fighting a smile.

Ser Carroll considered for a moment before grabbing the box of cookies. "Right this way, then," he said, and hopped into the ferry.

Elissa and Alistair shared a quick amused smile as they made their way over. Rebeka was glad that their relationship seemed to be taking a good turn, but over everything was a dark cloud of worry. She was putting her life in Elissa's hands if she stepped into that ferry.

"Sometimes, all you need is a little faith," Leliana said quietly as she passed by the mage.

Rebeka sighed. "I hope that's true," she muttered as she took her seat. Carroll pushed off and just like that it was too late to turn back.

* * *

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